A CONTEMPORARY SPIRITUALITY

I recently came across some words that I’d noted ages ago and then forgotten, as one does! They’re from a Japanese source named as Ryōkan, I’m not sure if that is an individual or a ‘school’ or maybe both. It doesn’t matter, what does is whether what is being said is true or not. I am assuming that the great teachings’ referred to are the spiritual teachings of many faith traditions.

“When we see clearly, the great teachings are the same“
What can ever be lost? What can be attained?

If we attain something, it was there from the beginning.

If we lose something, it is hiding somewhere near us.”

This is both simple and obvious when you think about it. When we discover something its new to us but not new in itself. Its always been there, waiting to be discovered. And similarly when we forget or lose something.

This is transferable wisdom to God. In reality God is everywhere & in everything, always. There may be times when God appears more or less real to our mind, or heart or soul. But God is always there.

Its our awareness that seems to let us down. But I’m not sure that that’s true either. My experience is that when God appears to have ‘disappeared’ it has been for one or two reasons: maybe both. Either in order to invite me to deepen my trust in God’s reality and love, despite the seeming lack of evidence. Or to widen my experience of how and where God might be encountered.

I remember being in a hospital bed and the only window in the ward looked out onto a brick wall. I longed for some green, the sight of a field or a tree, something natural, as God has always felt present for me in the midst of the natural world, but there was none available. Gradually I became aware of God’s love incarnate in the care and warmth of the nursing and care staff, and I ended up being quite grateful for the gift of the brick wall. It had directed my attention elsewhere and to my advantage. Maybe Jesus discovered something similar as He was dying on the cross?

There is a wonderful icon of Madonna and Child, in which they are playing hide and seek with Her veil: one and then the other hiding and then appearing. I think that it captures what I’m trying to articulate and Ryōkan would have agreed I reckon.