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Wednesday, November 1, 2017

Lamentations 5: A Prayer For Mercy

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Alan: I understand that we humans must "carry on" no matter what Life throws on our path.
And so, it is advisable - and if Life is the goal, even necessary - to find hope in any adversity.
Still, it is reasonable to propose that this need to maintain (or restore) hope facilitates our capture by a sort of spiritual Stockholm Syndrome.

Stockholm Syndrome

Like God "himself," it is possible that hope in adversity distills to nothing, and in extremis, must first reduce us to nothing.
But it is also possible that "nothingness" - when welcomed - can become a generative force.
Rather like nature abhoring a vacuum.
The nothingness of vacuity engenders real hope and real deity.
Ah! The Magnum Mysterium.

"The profoundest truths are paradoxical.
Lao Tze 

The central insight of Buddhism is sunyata, or emptiness.
However, sunyata (as I understand through my intellectual lens) is not "nothing" but "generative emptiness" - the void engendering being.
Ex nihilo creation.

The impasse contained in the scientific viewpoint itself can only be broken through by the attainment of a view of nothingness which goes further than, which transcends the nihil of nihilism.  The basic Buddhist insight of Sunyata, usually translated as "emptiness," "the void," or "no-Thingness," that transcends this nihil, offers a viewpoint that has no equivalent in Western thought.

The consciousness of the scientist, in his mechanized, dead and dumb universe, logically reaches the point where --- if he practices his science existentially and not merely intellectually -- the meaning of his own existence becomes an absurdity and he stands on the rim of the abyss of nihil face to face with his own nothingness.  People are not aware of this dilemma.  That it does not cause great concern is in itself a symptom of the sub-marine earthquake of which our most desperate world-problems are merely symptomatic.

... It is becoming ever clearer that the terrors of war, hunger and despoliation are neither economic, nor technolgical problems for which there are economic or technological solutions. They are primarily spiritual problems..."     Frederick Franck

Frederick Franck was born into a non-observant Jewish family in Holland. He was subsequently baptized a Protestant. After graduating as a dentist, Franck began the first dental clinic at Albert Schweitzer's hospital in West Africa.  Later, having embarked a career as writer and artist, Mr. Franck heeded Pope John XXIII's call to build a society of peace on earth (Pacem in Terris.)  Franck became the official artist of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) and, as a tribute to Pope John, has created a temple of all faiths called Pacem in Terris on his property in Warwick, New York.

Palestrina And Lauridsen: "O, Magnum Mysterium"

Mysterium Magnum And The Wonders Of Modern Physics (Michael Gerson)

The Tallis Scholars Sing Victoria's First Lamentation For Maundy Thursday

Lamentations (of Jeremiah)

A Prayer for Mercy

Remember, O Lord, what has happened to us.
    Look at us, and see our disgrace.
Our property is in the hands of strangers;
    foreigners are living in our homes.
Our fathers have been killed by the enemy,
    and now our mothers are widows.
We must pay for the water we drink;
    we must buy the wood we need for fuel.
Driven hard like donkeys or camels,
    we are tired, but are allowed no rest.
To get food enough to stay alive,
    we went begging to Egypt and Assyria.
Our ancestors sinned, but now they are gone,
    and we are suffering for their sins.
Our rulers are no better than slaves,
    and no one can save us from their power.
Murderers roam through the countryside;
    we risk our lives when we look for food.
10 Hunger has made us burn with fever
    until our skin is as hot as an oven.
11 Our wives have been raped on Mount Zion itself;
    in every Judean village our daughters have been forced to submit.
12 Our leaders have been taken and hanged;
    our elders are shown no respect.
13 Our young men are forced to grind grain like slaves;
    boys go staggering under heavy loads of wood.
14 The old people no longer sit at the city gate,
    and the young people no longer make music.
15 Happiness has gone out of our lives;
    grief has taken the place of our dances.
16 Nothing is left of all we were proud of.
    We sinned, and now we are doomed.
17 We are sick at our very hearts
    and can hardly see through our tears,
18 because Mount Zion lies lonely and deserted,
    and wild jackals prowl through its ruins.
19 But you, O Lord, are king forever
    and will rule to the end of time.
20 Why have you abandoned us so long?
    Will you ever remember us again?
21 Bring us back to you, Lord! Bring us back!
    Restore our ancient glory.
22 Or have you rejected us forever?
    Is there no limit to your anger?

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