Rafael: Entering the Gates
Life invites us to be present to the moment as it unfolds before us. And to wait for peace and justice to embrace us. I see the peace of God, not as something that I “achieve” through spiritual practices, but a place where I am always and already living in. My practice is to be awake so I can live in the presence, or better still, so I can live from it.
What if the “Kingdom of Heaven” that Jesus talked about was not so much a place we went to, but a place where are invited to come from? If we interpreted “contemplation” along these lines, then I suggest that anyone who wants to work with God in doing the work of peace will be helped by a community of people that live a life that “contemplates”.
Some Asians speak of contemplation as “entering the gates of heaven” and the idea is to enter it many times through whichever gate opens for you. If we can bring together the mystic and the prophet and the priest in all of us, would we perhaps be doing this work of peacemaking differently from the way we have done it in the past? Contemplation is not opposed to action. It is about being present to the action. It is when all of “who we are” is in harmony with “what we do”. And my experience is that this is the work of God in us, and not merely our own doing. “Someone fills the cup in front of us. We taste only sacredness” (Rumi).
