Uradiance

Throughout the physical universe, through every atom and star, flows a continuous current of names, yours among them. This sub-atom stream of sound is the meeting ground of physics and religion. Om Tamuz Shambu Ra! Eloi Shiva Christus Ma! O Nameless Tao Eternal Name Thousand-Petaled Thousand-Hearted Name with a Thousand Eyes, a Thousand Tongues of Flame! Father's name and mother's name conceiving the name of the Son, Mother vowel and father sibilant twining flames of black Calligraphy in white fire suckling verbs of virgin birth, Their Word made flesh in merest neuron and synaptic flash! Do not forget the name of their daughter Lilith laughter Of violent Titans dwelling in the hypothalamus Of galaxy Andromeda naming enormously from chaos The tiniest seashell Opalescent Nudibrank! And do not forget the name of her hands that hold The squirting nipple in our mouths the names of her fingers the pseudo-zygo-dactylous gesture of Mary! Or warrior-eyed and wrathful dance of twin names...

"Wheresoever you turn, there is the face of Allah!" (Qu'ran) "By hundreds and by thousands, behold my countless celestial forms." (Bhagavad Gita) Many planets, one sun. Many suns, one galaxy. Many divine faces, one God. In the late 16th Century, Christians could not tolerate a heliocentric universe. The Inquisition condemned masters of wisdom and science like Giordano Bruno and Galileo. Believers couldn't stand the thought that their religion was one among multiple systems of salvation, each appropriate for its planet, each planet being equally special in the eyes of the creator. If, as Bruno taught, there are countless worlds circling countless suns, then the centrality of Christ is undermined by the possibility that God created other races in His, or Her, divine image; those races may be unfallen; and such worlds may have no need for the precious blood of Jesus, or the sacraments of the Christian Church. Indeed, Bruno taught that God is present in every pa...

Chinese masters speak of "Wei Wu Wei," doing by not doing. An ancient Chinese general, having defeated several armies of invaders, declared, "I would rather retreat one mile than advance one inch." Is that action? In the "Bhagavad Gita," which was Gandhi's favorite book, God appears to the warrior, Arjuna, on a battlefield just before combat. Arjuna asks the Lord whether to fulfill his duty and fight, or refrain from battle. The Lord replies: "When you see stillness in action, and action in stillness, then you truly see." Quantum physics reveals that material particles vibrate out of a silent vacuum. Even more mysterious, the stillness of the vacuum is teeming with unmanifest "virtual" particles. It seems this entire world of physical activity is pervaded by stillness. If you march in a political demonstration, passionately shouting your beliefs against those who shout against you, shutting down traffic and commerce to stop the war,...

Imagine your Body. Let your Body imagine you. Your Body is all you have imagined until now. Your Soul is the glow of your Body this moment. What you imagine today is your Body tomorrow. To imagine anything but your Body is a dream. To imagine that your Body is any less than a cosmos, each cell a furnace roaring with delight, each atom a wild and perfect swirl of sentience whose center is the womb of suns, and in the silence at the proton's core, the infinitesimal pause between the pulse of quark and anti-quark, this sky, this vast out-whirling mother of night who mantles all our hope with stars: To imagine your Body anything less is the only Sin.

"Hatred cannot conquer hatred. Hatred is only conquered by love." (Dhammapada of Buddha) "Have compassion for your enemy, and pray for those who persecute you." (Gospel of Christ) We meditate for the earth's oppressed on the Tibetan New Year, February 25. For them we chant, Om Ah Hung . We remember those whom the world has forgotten. We remember the sufferings of Buddhists in Tibet, of Baha'i in Iran, of Christians in China, of Palestinians and Jews in the troubled lands of Gaza, Israel and the Left Bank of the Jordon. We remember all who suffer in Dafur, Zaire, the Sudan, in Iraq and Afghanistan. We remember the sufferings of New Orleans. We call to mind those who are dear to us, speaking their names or holding them silently in the light of compassion.... May the fruits of our meditation nourish not only the oppressed but the oppressors, whose minds are confused through lack of peace, whose deeds are bitter through lack of joy, who project the shadows of th...

" Man has no Body distinct from his Soul: for that called Body is a portion of Soul discerned by the five senses, the chief inlets of Soul in this age. " ( William Blake ) "Eternity was in our lips and eyes." ( Shakespeare ) You are invited to relax and expand through your senses. Each of your senses - hearing, seeing, taste, touch, smell - is a spectrum of consciousness that widens from the dense physical organ in your body to all-pervading space, embracing the galaxies. You may release yourself now from constricted, obsessive, genital-centered sexuality to Cosmic Eros. Cosmic Eros is the sensation that irradiates the universe. Cosmic Eros is non-localized: it overflows the locus of the bodily organ. Cosmic Eros spills from each rain drop and star, each budding twig and human cell. Just as sap permeates the stem, leaf and petal of a flower, Cosmic Eros saturates the world. Enlivening all who are graced with embodiment, Cosmic Eros is the out-flowing sensuality o...