Meditation I

Adam naming the Animals 

To start from the beginning is to implicitly suggest that our genesis can be separated from our conclusion. The journey that has no destination. Yet, even journeys with no end in sight still commence knowing they will eventually come to a close. Perhaps the death of the traveler themselves. In this way, every story begins with "In the beginning" and ends with an amen, "so be it". 

To continue on with this meditation, the story we share of ourselves, both individually and collectively, shape the way in which we live, move, and have our being. How we see our birth and how we view our death dictate - inasmuch as a speaker dictates to a scribe who has his own unique script and note taking strategies - how we go about interacting with those around us, human or not.

We have a conclusion that continues into eternity, the ever growing in toward He whom we call God. As 2 Peter confirms and Genesis 1 makes explicit, we are to be partakers of the divine nature and the breathing icons of God Himself. Humanity was spoken as a poem in a way that sees poetry, as poesis, making and doing, as who we are. With the creation narrative, we learn that God spoke all things into existence. The Word par excellence is the Word that sustains us and continues to speak our lives into being. We are only because He Is. Inhabited by the Word, creation was graced with God's presence. God ever walking amongst his Creation. The loving outpouring of himself to those most different, and still most immanent.

It is here were we find the primordial Eden: the garden situated between physical and spiritual rivers that flow both ways. Guarded by the flaming ones and situated with spiritual beings that transform into earthly creatures - snakes that spoke and walked upon now hidden legs. This image of the Edenic paradise brings together the painting of our existence and the refining of our being in the act of poetry. 

To much dismay, Eve and Adam were convinced that to be creators (inasmuch as they are images of God) is to take the fruit of beauty in direct violation of the Creator. The snake, who slithers like history repeats and progresses, saw the innocent children and thrust them into adulthood with no warning. This event, the eating and partaking of a fruit slated for adulthood, brought upon consequences and endings that we weren't expecting. To be like the gods was not yet realized by us. We were still experiencing the bliss of childhood, frolicking around the garden and waiting for our Parent to guide us in the way of becoming likewise. All of humankind and creation partakes in this disgraceful act. The snake, as animal, for tempting, the tree, as vegetation, for giving the fruit up. And we have suffered. No wonder there's a sigh too deep for words. We are written poems who have lost and ignored the voice that sang us. 

True, there are hints for what we are meant to be: the naming of the animals gave us a foretaste of our priestly functions. We are to sing the songs of creation because we, as beings between God and the earth, have the ability to see and participate, hear and proclaim the breath that allows Creation to live - the name by which all others are named. The poetics, the making, of all that is. The Spirit that is peace beyond all understanding. We, as priests, proclaim this knowledge to all the mountains standing at attention waiting to be moved and to all the trees dancing to the harmony of the spheres. The heavens proclaim the deepest mysteries of God and the winds whisper the lyric of His love.

Our tilling of the ground and painful births are only shadows of what we are to become: Birthed within us is the Christ that brings forth the fruits of love in which we are to labor and work at. Like the naming of animals, so too is our duty to realize the beauty of Creation. To write poems, make music, or sing songs, as liturgically proclaiming the Incarnation of the Word is to name all things in Christ. It is here were we realize that the waters separated because Christ is both Human and Divine. God acting within Creation, as Creation. Our journey consists of living through His life and looking about perceiving this reality. Once we reach the end of the journey, we will hopefully have recognized this miracle and see that the water flowing from the rock is truly the Living Water. That when things may seem puzzling,( what is it?), it is the Living Bread blown in by the Wind we call Holy. In this we realize that consequences, which have been actualized by our choices, aren't always curses. Or, curses are blessings that are waiting to bloom. Or, that God is in all and with all. It is His voice that carries the song of creation. It is the Great Spirit that brings life to Mother Earth. It is the Word, made flesh, who inhabits every word spoken. Creation is imbued with the words and names we have lost to our ill-decided act of tearing creation asunder - forgetting the tree which bore the fruit. And the God who clothed us with skin from those forgotten creatures, will be the light that awakens us from our slumber and clothes us with the sun, the Christ - the head of earth, the head of all Creation. By Him, we see those hidden beings and see the names ascribed upon them. So, we sing their names and bring light to those in the darkness. A city of peace where the gates are never shut. Glory be to God in the highest!