I mine comments. I mine them from other places, and I mine my comment stream. And so I need to thank M, who has written this exemplar, quoting me and then making the pagan argument — that gluttony and fornication are somehow spiritual if balanced with enough meditation.
“The Colossian passage is just so unfashionable. God is asking that all
those who are single (my sons, me, and all those who now consider Eat Pray Love as part of scripture) That we should get rid of anything that is impure, unworthy, and stop worshipping our lusts.”Do you read the book or see the movie. Getting rid of lusts and other vices was part of it. Hence the stint in an Indian ashram consisting of tight discipline and meditation.
Statistics reported a spike in meditation course enrollment after that movie was released and when I saw it the audience was talking about how they want to start a spiritual discipline.
I have read Elizabeth Glibert’s work. She is another useful idiot, for her books serve as a warning. Of how we can look at ourselves as glorious, and worship the lies we tell each other, seeing the glory in creation and being blinded to the greater glory. For the glory of God is terrible. One cannot gaze on it. We become not merely insignificant, but more importantly know, and our works appear tawdry, dirty, and incomplete.
2Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain apart, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, 3and his clothes became dazzling white, such as no one on earth could bleach them. 4And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, who were talking with Jesus. 5Then Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” 6He did not know what to say, for they were terrified. 7Then a cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud there came a voice, “This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!” 8Suddenly when they looked around, they saw no one with them any more, but only Jesus.
9As they were coming down the mountain, he ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead. 10So they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what this rising from the dead could mean. 11Then they asked him, “Why do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?” 12He said to them, “Elijah is indeed coming first to restore all things. How then is it written about the Son of Man, that he is to go through many sufferings and be treated with contempt? 13But I tell you that Elijah has come, and they did to him whatever they pleased, as it is written about him.”
jesus was talking about John the Baptizer as Elijah who was to come. For John turned the hearts of many back to God. What the transfiguration gives is is a mere glimpse of what is the glory to come. We cannot deal with this.
We would rather turn to ritual, to precept, to asceticism or indulgence (or both). We would rather worship creation. but that is not eternal. Only Christ is. The idea that we can be like Gods is the first lie, the ur-lie, the cause of the fall and the fundamental point of the Hinduist myth of reincarnation.
But we are not God, and we cannot have his glory. We can only be akin to him, made in his likeness. That is glory enough: we glimpse this in the ongoing beauty of the young, knowing that each young person will themselves fade as they get hit by that ugly stick called growing old. The practice of spirituality, chasing the feeling of one ness with the universe, is but a lie. It relies on emotions, and they last as long as the cherry blossoms.
For the true glory belongs with God. We cannot see that: it hurts too much. But he alone is worthy of worship.
I certainly don’t hold Gilbert up as any example of an accomplished meditator. Meditation and the wisdom traditions of Asia are, like everything else in the US, approached in a shallow, consumerist fashion.
Its your culture, you people can’t help it.
However, my point was the Manosphere was wrong about EPL. They claimed it was “divorce porn” and that audiences were leaving the theaters inspired to run home and announce divorce to their hapless spouses.
But that was not the effect of the film at all. I saw it twice in the theaters and both times a lot of people were talking during and after it about how they were inspired to take up some meditational practice. Yoga center enrollments spiked after that movie, as did tourism to India.
(Plus, Gilbert’s husband had the last laugh as he remarried and had kids with a more attractive woman and is STILL living on Gilbert’s dime as alimony for him was part of the divorce deal).
So not only did the Manosphere get it entirely wrong, the movie, though nothing but typical American consumerist fluff, has inspired many people to turn inward.
Like you, I don’t have confidence in the cognitive or spiritual capabilities of most Americans. Yoga, Vedanta, meditation, whatever it is, will remain shallow consumerist hobbies for most of them. HOWEVER, that in itself is a positive shift as it provides a gateway for those who are genuine and sincere.
From a pop-culture intro to yoga a typical American might find his way to a yoga center. Yoga centers used to only offer asana but now they are increasingly offering pranayama, dhyana, Sutra and Vedanta classes, etc.
Gradually, over the course of the last so many years, there has been a slow shift to deeper and more authentic study and practice to the point where now there are indeed some very serious American practitioners.
So it doesn’t bother me at all that the large bulk are surfing the shallow waters because its trendy. Those shallow waters are still a gateway for the serious to take it to the next level and the level after that.
Small steps, my friend. Small steps.