jimwdollar

Tools? Or, Props?

We live at cross-purposes. When the church says something is important, but then lives as though something else is important, it is called “hypocrisy.” In the world it is called “business as usual.” What we say is important in either place varies from person to person, from situation to situation, from time to time. WhatContinue reading “Tools? Or, Props?”

Communities of Innocence

We need help realizing, remembering, connecting with, and living out of the heart of what matters most. Yet, that’s the first thing to go—our connection with the heart of what matters most. We need a community to help us nourish, enable, sustain, and deepen our relationship with the heart of what matters most. We needContinue reading “Communities of Innocence”

Doing Justice

If we are going to take spiritual growth seriously, we are going to have to take doing justice seriously. We’re going to have to get to work reforming society. It takes a revolution to bring justice to life. Justice doesn’t come about because everyone agrees that it ought to, or because everyone thinks it wouldContinue reading “Doing Justice”

Arrogance and the Profit Motive

I don’t know of anything that works better than arrogance for creating an intolerable situation for ourselves and others. That is probably why the biblical writers place so much emphasis on humility as the oil that enables relationship and life. It is too bad all their hard work is so wasted on us. The UnitedContinue reading “Arrogance and the Profit Motive”

Here’s To The Day!

“Here’s to the day! May it be all I need it to be—and may I be all it needs me to be!” That’s good enough, I think, for a morning prayer. It reminds us that we need things from the day, and the day needs things from us. That’s the fundamental deal. We have toContinue reading “Here’s To The Day! “

The Path to Numinous Reality

At times, our experience of life can sit us down and stun us into silence with the depth, and breadth, and marvel of creation. The fact that we are alive and a part of the all-ness of things can be overwhelming in an awe-inspiring kind of way. We can be amazed at being amazed. ToContinue reading “The Path to Numinous Reality”

The Mythic Vision

There is that into which we cannot go. Call it the Mythic Realm—or anything you want to call it. Just know that it’s there, and we aren’t going to figure it out any more than we can figure out True Love. We don’t know what the deal is, or how, or why it works theContinue reading “The Mythic Vision”

It’s a Shifting Perspective…

We are all fundamentalist fanatics at heart. We are all literalists at heart. We hate ambivalence and ambiguity, and want things to be nailed down, spelled out, clearly defined. We want things to be black or white, right or wrong, cut and dried, one way or the other—and to stay that way! We want toContinue reading “It’s a Shifting Perspective…”

Learning to be Individuals

As a species, we are moving out of the tribal orientation of group think —where no one had an idea of her, of his, own, and everyone lived the way life had always been lived before them —where everyone knew how it was supposed to be done, because nothing new was ever done —where theContinue reading “Learning to be Individuals”

Creating a Worthy Life

Brooks Vance advised his wife, “Don’t add up the liabilities, Louise. It will only depress you.” This is not denial. This is recognizing the futility of rehashing what has been done to us, of living with our backs to the future and our arms reaching out to that which cannot be. The spiritual task isContinue reading “Creating a Worthy Life”