The Soul and Its Nature, Part I

The search for a path through life

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Photo: Image of a Vineyard, from a capital in the Cathedral of St. Lazarus in Autun, France. The other images in the essay are also from Autun. Photographs by the author.

Yesterday, while I was pondering the question of how we are and what we are doing here in life, the following thought occurred to me:

If we are not connected to the Love that lies at the heart of this earthly enterprise, we cannot bring it forth.

Of course, this follows on my set of observations last year regarding the relationship between the practice of loving kindness and inner spiritual effort in general. And so this morning's essay is a little soliloquy about these questions, a coda to my ponderings of last year. (viz., Notes for the Reformation, download below in pdf format).

Having recently spoken about the way in which my various and sundry religious ecstasies in 2001-2002 were medieval, I suppose this little essay will reveal how very medieval my spiritual thought itself is; and yet I know of no other place from which to think properly about the soul and its nature.

When we lack loving kindness, the world lacks it. And so when we embark on the search for what is fundamental, essential, necessary, should we not begin there? Should we not begin to understand what it means to be loving and kind? Ask ourselves whether we are truly that way towards others?

In today's divisive society, where hatred and hate speech are common place enough, and human beings continue to murder one another as they always have, it seems to me that it's more important than ever to examine every single inner motive in great detail. To hold it to the light and inspect its nature, try to understand where it comes from and what it stands in relationship to.