20110827

Salutation #47

A DEAF PERSON who goes through life learning to listen soon becomes wiser than a person who hears but never learns to listen.

While it is entirely possible - even desirable - to overcome this world without much speaking, without listening we are utterly ruined.

(The Wisdom of Listening)

If we are to proceed in the way of our learning,

from God to the communities embraced by His Providence,

we must learn to listen attentively to the reality

of the instruments of Providence.

It is always better to learn from persons

by our trust in the inherent good of others

- than to seek to unlearn -

the sincerity native to our good will

by nurturing any bitterness stemming from hurt

or from any perceived lack of good in the person of others.

This is always true with regard to those

whose littleness and difficulties conceal from many

the true value of their instruction

- all who are the least among others -

whom the darkness of this world blindly rejects.

For this must always come by way of false comparisons

that rob ourselves and others of our particular sense of uniqueness

and removes us further from the truth.

Therefore,

let us make it a rule of our everyday living

that it is always better to listen first than to ask first.

We must be listeners first and speakers last.

For much listening shall often reveal to us the answers

where much speaking give rise only to questions.

And counsel that is well-received

is worth more than a thousand questions.

But if we must know how to listen to the counsel of others,

we must also learn how ably we must bend - against our own will -

and this bending is the bending of obedience.

All our hearing amounts to nothing

if our listening does not lead to discernment.

For all our listening is a form of obedience.

It is wise only inasmuch as it leads us to the truth.

We must understand - first - that obedience merits much

only when we are taught in the way of mutual trust and respect,

in an atmosphere of understanding, and in the freedom of the truth.

When obedience fails,

it fails because it is given blindly

or when it is a choice wrongly taken away

or as a bondage that is forced against the will.

This is ignorance, timidity and oppression - respectively -

and it avails evil people much but then again,

by token of these same things,

it can also be said if we know how to listen to Providence

- that their evil is but a thing permitted -

by each and every one of us

who by token of their same evil,

are led to the leadings of the good.

For all tyranny that matures,

matures only because it is an evil allowed by the people.

Obedience - in a nation -

is neither servility nor weakness.

It is the strength to know the truth

as well as the resilience to uphold it,

in sacred remembrance of each other;

it is as the bending of a bow - aimed towards the infinite -

we let fly not because we are hurt,

we let fly because we have finally found

our peace with each other.

To not be ignorant, we must know to ask.

To not be timid, we must learn to know to ask.

To not be oppressed, we must learn to know

to always ask without fail.

---<--@

Most of the things that love says is never said at all.

---<--@

The Question -

An angel asked me, "...and what do I love, O heart?" For I longed to know.

It led me to a shop and showed me a thing I desired for myself but could not yet afford. Something I knew I knew but did not really think about that much.

"I love all these things that you love, O heart, that leads you to be good", the angel said to me.

"I love all the good clothes that was made for you, I love the cell phone that you'd so wished for so much, oh and that laptop - I love that as well - for you, O heart."

"So how do you love me in return?" The angel's question seem to echo from deep into my being for the lesson has now penetrated me indelibly right into my heart.

There was silence:

"You shall love the LORD thy God as one LORD alone".

"Make peace with the all of creation. Divide it not. Say peace to the river, to the sky, to the earth, to the animals (and the trees) of the earth and the fishes of the seas, to thy nations good will and to all thy fellow human beings, life and abundance. Do this if you love me."
---<--@

Our Land of Promise -

The nationhood that is our Promise shall not be as a house of cards, empty of substance, propped up by countless divisions, inspired by diverse and manifold hatreds;selfish, evil, reckless, irresponsible, and adulterous in the sight of God, Angels and Man.

We shall not be as a house in constant rebellion against its own lineages of truth - we shall not be this way.

We shall be the meaning that lives inside of our words, my beloved brothers and sisters of the Promise - the citizenship inside of ourselves - for ours is a spiritual renaissance.

---<--@

National Heroes Day and Eid al-Fitr 2011 -

This last Monday of August is National Heroes Day (August 29).

The following day, August 30, is Eid al-Fitr which is the event that marks the completion of the cycle of Ramadan for our Muslim brothers and sisters of the Promise.

Both of these days are legally recognized as public holidays in our Philippines.

In this pivotal year, my honorable Filipino compatriots, I bid us to welcome these commemorations as one nation and to honor these days, as citizens to each other, with remembrances proper to the peace of our Philippines.

Let us reflect upon this peace.

May we learn to keep it, one to another, as keeper and friend.

---<--@

Mabuhay ang Pilipinas! Peace. Salaam. Shalom. God bless us all.

Ignite

Starshine,
your addiction is to life.

There is nothing worthy
about things that cause harm -
Destruction is only good
if it brings about growth and transformation.

So remember this
when you shall desire to find yourself
when you shall seek to one day be
as stars looking out from yourself
possessed by your own light,
being by the one Beautiful beheld
seeing far into the darkness
of our needful world:
Make no provision in your heart
for evil things: Here, Now.

For there will come a time in your life
when you shall be confused
when you shall cross an imperceptible threshold
into an in-between world -
By the ebb and flow tides of shadow and light,
you shall wander alone with the Alone
and you will be compelled to look for those things
that are meant to be yours
as well as forced to shed away all other things
that should no-wise belong to you.

So listen to good counsel, Beloved of God,
for it is better not to begin weeping
than to weep until the tears that was begun
are all shed away by our weeping together
for before you can shed your own starlight,
our most precious Starshine,
before the love in your heart ignites,
you must first shed away all your tears.
---<--@