Category Archives: Uncategorized

The Early Church Phenomenon of Gnosticism (7th Sept 2023)

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Over the past year I have been researching the early Church phenomenon of Gnosticism. I have found it a fascinating and helpful study in coming to understand the diverse nature of early Christianity and the dynamics behind it. I’m currently engaged with a course of lectures by Professor David Brakkie of the University of Ohio, on what the Nag Hammadi scrolls reveal to us about early Christianity, especially the work of Valentinius. What has interested me is how this tradition has value in terms of understanding some of the problems of the world today, especially our reductionist scientific materialism leading to our rejection of the spiritual and transcendent. This reductionist approach has given rise to nihilism. In terms of societal values about what is meaningful and purposeful, our materialistic, consumer focused culture has given rise to addictions, gross consumption and global self-sabotage, (the latter seen in endless debt, the problem of climate change and vast social inequality). Filmmaker, Robert Bonomo has made a documentary that analyses how systems of political power, economics and consumption are our modern day ‘Archons’ and that these systems arise out of our conscious capacity for creation.
 
A minority of Christians in my social media friends list have been apoplectic by my finding any value in ancient Gnostic wisdom, almost accusing me of creation denial. How funny that being interested, informed and curious about something causes people to accuse you of “becoming” something.
 
I sense that the Gnostics were a minority of believers who wanted a level of spiritual depth that went beyond belief into substantial transpersonal experience. This was expressed in the religious language and thought forms available at that time and in places where Christianity was developing. Unfortunately the early Church Fathers engaged in apologetics rather than trying to understand the phenomenon which led to separation rather than integration.
 
I wonder what Valentinius and Marcion would have said about the problems of todays world?

Universe as Hologram (12th Sept 2023)

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The more I have considered the work of some very talented scientists, in particular Jude Currivan PhD and Dr Donald Hoffman, the more I am coming to be persuaded that the nature of the universe is Holographic. This theory has credibility with scientists from institutions such as Cambridge, Princeton and Columbia. Currivan more cautiously uses the word “Holographic” rather than ‘simulation’, to describe the phenomenon of the universe, with the former attributing meaning and purpose to the universe from its underlying properties of consciousness, whereas simulation suggests unreality. She speaks of the universe as “a living, sentient, conscious, non locally unified entity from it’s very beginnings”. The universe emerges from greater consciousness. Currivan speaks of physicists whose observations of the quantum world led them to the Vedas and writings of the Rishis of India, whose wisdom matched the observations of these scientists about the universe, that reality emerges from deeper levels of non locality. Currivan suggests that consciousness connects humanity to the vast interconnected aspects of cosmic information, and therefore suggests that we are manifestations and co-creators of the universe. This has resonance with Plato’s idea of the world being an imperfect representation of perfect forms of a greater reality. The universe as the manifestation of consciousness was at the heart of non dual Advaita Vedanta, the Gnostic mythology and the notion of creation emerging from the Logos. The creation myths were meant to ascribe meaning to the universe, whatever are its constituents. Intuitively this explanation holds closer to the truth to me.

Intellect of the Heart (15th September 2023)

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The human intellect, even the greatest intellect, is fallible and and limited when facing the immense nature of a limitless universe. Wisdom on the other hand has little relationship to the intellect. Wisdom doesn’t process problems through rational, deductive logic, but rather utilises and guides the intellect In the process of knowing and understanding. The foundation of wisdom is found in the human heart. The intelligence of the heart directs the rational intellect in understanding. The knowing of the human heart is the place where geniuses begin their questioning. The intellect operates in the arena of the ego, and needs the guidance of the heart to understand depth and complexity.

Fraticelli (Italian for “Little Brethren”) 24th Sept 2023

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I have recently learned of a Franciscan movement that existed for a short time after the death of St Francis, called the ‘Fraticelli’. The Fraticelli (Italian for “Little Brethren”) or ‘Spiritual Franciscans’ who desired to live more closely to the original ideal of poverty, as lived by St Francis (and dare I say St Clare too) but were repudiated by the institutional Church for their position. Sadly, some members were burned at the stake and others excommunicated and persecuted. The Fraticelli felt justified in conscience to reject the authority of popes and bishops claiming the gospel as their authority over the ideas of the papacy. They had a flavour about them akin to some of the early Church movements that scorned the materiel wealth and imperial power of the church and who came into similar conflicts with ecclesiastical power and control. I have come across a historical analysis of the history of the Fraticelli called ‘The Spiritual Franciscans: From Protest to Persecution in the Century After Saint Francis’ by David Burr: https://www.psupress.org/books/titles/0-271-02128-4.html

 

The Martyrs of Languedoc

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The Cathars of Languedoc have been very near to my mind and heart since I first heard about them in 2011, and then started learning more about them in recent years. My sense of closeness to this medieval group has grown considerably in the past few months. This is not because of their creed or beliefs, but because of their ability to be a real community to one another; to love their spiritual beliefs despite the threat, power and dominance of the medieval Catholic Church, and their willingness to confront the corruption of the medieval Church. The Cathars endured torture and extermination beyond what the reformation martyrs endured. A million men, women and children killed, many burned alive at the stake on huge pyres or made to walk into huge fires. The inquisition said “The smallest trace of “sin” had to be extirpated and the corrupt body had to be destroyed and evil exorcised in the flames….”. The power of love, the gift of community and the repudiation of worldly power mark their life and witness. They were loved by their fellow non Cathar citizens.
 
Martyrs of Languedoc ~ pray for us 🙏

Emancipating divinity from patriarchy through the heart ~ Rev Brendan Mooney OEC

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I am reading a book called Setting God Free by Fr Sean O’Laoire, an Irish Catholic priest who is spiritual director to a community of lay people in California called Companions on the Journey. He is a beautiful soul; a radical, imaginative, intelligent and compassionate man who is deeply respected by many people across many spiritual traditions.

Sean began his spiritual journey as a child in County Cork, Ireland, and was deeply influenced by his kind hearted Catholic grandmother whom he describes as a genuine mystic who lived comfortably between this world and the divine realm. His grandfather was a druid who was deeply embedded in the mysticism of his tradition. The influence of two deeply spiritual grandparents in his early life and living in a Gaelic speaking community, immersed him in the earthiness of Celtic Spirituality.

In the 1960s Sean studied for the Roman Catholic priesthood. His studies consisted of pure mathematics and physics followed by several years of academic philosophy, scripture and theology. He spent many years working in Africa as a priest after his ordination. During his time in Africa he became knowledgeable of the local ancient wisdom and spiritual traditions of the people whom he served. He later went to the United State where he studied for a PhD in Transpersonal Psychology and became a clinical psychologist. His study of mathematics, theology, philosophy, spirituality, transpersonal psychology and many other disciplines, informs his ongoing spiritual inquiry and development. His aim is to contribute to the development of a spirituality that is enriching and transformative to the evolution of global human consciousness.  

Sean has lost favor with the institutional Roman Catholic Church, and so now is ministering independently from the institutional Church. He has a very broad and encompassing cosmology which seeks to free people from unwholesome, oppressive and discriminatory anthropomorphisms of God that create separation and division. Sean in his book, Setting God Free talks about an experience whilst ministering at a Catholic parish in Palo Alto, California in the 1980s, which deeply influenced his decision to carefully examine and retool his religious cosmology. He had a close friend, a Jewish woman called Arlen who decided to bring her mother to Mass to meet Sean in person. Arlen’s mother was a survivor of the Holocaust and had lost many family members in an Easter Pogrom. The Gospel of the day at the Mass attended by Arlen and her mother caused him to feel profound discomfort. It was the story from John’s Gospel of Pilate absolving himself of the blood of Jesus, and in which John records the “Jews” as saying, “His blood be upon us and upon our children”. The ramifications of this anti-Semitic passage, and how it was used by the post Constantinian Church to orchestrate persecutions against the Jewish people, landed deeply with him. This was a turning point in Sean’s spiritual journey that changed everything. He believes that creating a god in our own image, rather than seeking the God in whose image we are made, is something that needs to change if God is to mean anything purposeful for human conscious evolution.

Sean’s book spoke deeply to me about how religion, when it becomes self-referential, institutionalized and concerned with its own image, becomes something that doesn’t serve humanity’s journey of conscious evolution. I believe that this evolution is importantly something that must be rooted in the human heart, in a spaciousness of deep compassion, love and service to others. Sean O’Laoire makes a very important observation:

“God is nothing like the religion has made out to be –especially the jealous, irascible, patriarchal, genocidal god of the world’s greatest monotheistic religions”

In the theistic religious traditions throughout history, divinity has been the object of egoic patriarchal projections creating a caricature of God. These traditions have often been unfriendly towards the lives, liberties and bodies of both women and children. Within the Christian Church patriarchally informed projections about God have created an ecclesiology that bolsters systemic clerical power and privilege over others. It has privileged a patriarchal ecclesiology over and above an organic ecclesiology that draws upon the diverse gifts, wisdom, experience and insights of the whole people of God. The term people of God only became a meaningful concept within the Catholic Church in the 1960s during the Second Vatican Council.

The notion of God as the divine feminine (i.e., the goddess or divine mother) has been ignored by institutionalized theistic religion in favour of a muscular, militaria, patriarchal God who most often sides with male clerical, authoritarian, and even, military, power. Even now, in these days of liberation, feminist, black liberation and creation centred theologies, the idea of God as a tender, strong and protective mother – akin to the Buddhist image of the compassionate and protective Tara emancipating her children from suffering oppression and fear – is rarely a reference point for theology or liturgy. Sophia, as feminine divine wisdom, is also an underrepresented image of divinity in ecclesiastical language. Most often the notion of a male god who speaks through a patriarchal system of authority, and who is exclusively called, Father, is the most privileged image of the divine.

I would suggest that each one of us would do well to take governance over our own personal cosmology, ecclesiology and spirituality. Be discerning of ecclesiastical patriarchs, grandiose gurus, authoritative teachers and dynamic evangelists who claim that their way is the best way. There is one divine ocean that flows into many wells. You and I are one of those wells. The true teacher is within you. Good spiritual teachers will always point you towards your inner teacher. Your mind when immersed in the tender place of your heart, quietly listening for divine wisdom, is a good space to discern for the whisperings of divinity.

Namaste brothers and sisters 

References:

Setting God Free: Moving Beyond the Caricature We’ve Created in Our Own Image, 2021, by Sean O’Laoire, Apocryphille Press US.

Interview by Evan McDermod of Fr Sean O’Laoire, Setting God Free, YouTube, December 2022 Seán ÓLaoire – Setting God Free (Podcast Interview) – YouTube

The Way of Grace: The Transforming Power of Ego Relaxation  – 1 Nov. 2018 by Miranda Macpherson, Sounds True Press

New Seeds of Contemplation by Thomas Merton, New Directions Paperbook, 1091) Paperback – Illustrated, 13 Nov. 2007