Consciousness, Creation, Buddhism and the Bible in 60 seconds

IN THE BEGINNINGS: A Semi-serious Sonnet

So ...

God rested on the seventh day.

We have accepted that on faith.

But Scripture doesn't really say

what He did on Day the Eighth.

It seems that only Heaven knows

just how God spent that second week

With omnipotence would you suppose

He'd hit the beach in Martinique?

No!

Creators don't stop making things!

He would make some more dimensions

Full of divine imaginings,

    truly marvelous inventions,

        and Creatures unlike me and you.

That is what creators do!

Glory to God (St. Cecelia's Mass of Hope )

Free sheet music

Lucid, Vincent Glory to God (St Cecelia's Mass of Hope) + MP3 (digital interpretation) / MIDI Choral SATB Mass; Choir; Sacred / 2010 V. J. Lucid © All rights reserved Make a donation to Vincent Lucid Powered by Free-scores.com

Ave! Maria

My Ave Maria has been downloaded nearly 400 times by visitors from about 70 countries, including: Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Japan, China, Jibouti, Ivory Coast and other surprising places. Thanks to Google and the other search engines that put it on page 1 of an image search.  Go figure !

Lucid, Vincent Ave Maria + MP3 (digital interpretation) / MIDIPiano and Voice Mass; Choir; Sacred / 2003, 2010 Vincent J. Lucid © All rights reserved Make a donation to Vincent Lucid Powered by Free-scores.com

What is LOVE? Who is GOD? Mysticism for the Shallow Mind

 LOVE is GOD ~
     for GOD is LOVE (1 John 4:8) ~ 
All of it! 
Every warm feeling or thought, 
Every kind word, spoken or written,
Every secret longing, every unselfish action or prayer ~
    ever and everywhere, since the first light of the first dawn.
The unseen, often unfelt, centripetal force that makes us One.
That is what Love is -- and that is who God is.  
Powerful beyond comprehension.  
All the rest is garbage or glitter.
Any more questions?

--  an excerpt from the imaginary anthology, "Mysticism for the Shallow Mind"

TRUSTING in GOD

Suppose you’re on the edge of a cliff, the brink of the Unknown.
You’re facing the setting sun, an angry sea behind you, far below.
Suppose God asks you to stand on your toes,
raise your arms into a crucifixion pose -- and fall backwards,
trusting that the ocean has been filled with God's Grace.
Could you do it?  There's no shame in saying "No".
So, let’s try something with a little less risk.
Shall we?

Go into your bedroom tonight and turn off the light.
Close the door, leaving your worries in the hall --
preferably in a plastic bag, all tied-up tight.
Sit on the foot of your bed and say two little prayers:
one for someone you know, and another for someone you don't.
Then, try to sit for at least a minute without thinking at all.
Just listen.  In the Darkness, God says, "Trust Me."
Did you hear it?

God says your Guardian Angel just sprinkled Grace
all over your blanket, like Tinkerbell and her pixie dust.
She stuffed some in your pillow, too; and there’s plenty left over.
(If you recall, God had planned to fill the ocean with Grace.)
Now, fall backwards from your sitting position,
rest your head on that pillow and cover up with that blanket.
Let God keep the world spinning for a while without your help.
Can you do it?

Let go, Dear Heart, and sleep in serenity
trusting that God will send the Morning Sun
to bring warmth, light for your path and new hope.
Perhaps the Garbage Angel will pick up your worries before you awaken.
Above all, remember God's promise to bless you
with all the Grace you’ll need to get through One More Day.
Since the day you were born, God has always kept that promise.
Hasn't She?

St. Cecelia's Mass of Hope

After eight years, off and on (mostly off),
I have updated St. Cecelia's Mass of Hope
for the next-to-last time.

Now, I can write the Alleluia and move on ("Alleluia" indeed).
I am finishing up just as the Vatican is changing the words.  
I hope Episcopalians discover it.  They can sing it "as is".
I'll look at it all again sometime in early 2011 and
perhaps update it according to the new Roman Missal.
While revising the words, I'll write a melody line
that the average RC congregation could sing (if they actually tried)
and harmony (with less ornamentation) for your average Catholic choir.
For now, at the risk of excommunication, the working title
for the final Catholic update is Messa di Bingo".* 

So, whatever room of God's house you reside in at the moment,
please have a listen to St. Cecelia's Mass of Hope.
I suggest that start with the Gloria,
the Lamb of God,
and more if you have time.
Look at the scores and sing along with the MIDIs.
"Kyrioke!". [Sorry, I couldn't resist].

I would be absolutely delighted to hear your comments,
even if you think it's bubble-gum music or totally unsingable.
The only part ever performed, as far as I know, is The Lord's Prayer.
The Syracuse  Chorale, 80 voices +/- did the world premier
at the Episcopal Cathedral in Syracuse for a 2009 Christmas Concert.
It was an honor for me, especially to be on a program with Vivaldi.
I got to take a bow.   He didn't.
__________________________
*Someone once asked
      "What's a Catholic Church without Bingo?"
It was a rhetorical question. I answered it anyway,
and blurted out  "An Episcopal Church!". 
[Transubstantiation is easily overlooked; and American
Catholics don't pay strict attention to the Pope anyway.]

I'm told a Bingo Mass won't sell in the South.
Bingo is a Northeast phenomenom (like Kennedy's, I suppose) 
How about "The Mass of Grace and Grits" as a Southern alias.
Why? Because (according to Scott Peck) a wise southerner once told a Yankee,
puzzled by the white stuff on his breakfast platter,
"Them's Grits. They're like Grace. You don't order them. They just come."

CHRIST on an Acrostic: The Cross is Us!

Christ did not cease to suffer after His death.
He endures our pain: every stab, every woe.
Remember that He arose before He ascended.
It matters not that His body once died.
Still suffering ~ for us ~  Christ lives
Though He insists His burden is light.

"Know that I am with you always."  [Matthew:28-20]

A PCYNICAL PSALM

Note:  The P is silent, as in swimming.


This is the day the Lord has made;
but let's not get too overjoyed.
For minute by minute it's destined to fade;
and once it's gone by, it's destroyed.


This little gem is just a reminder that I'm still on the planet.
I've been busy writing music -- soon to be presented on DrSpeedbump.com

A SPECIAL BLESSING for SOMEONE I'VE KNOWN ALL MY LIFE

FOR ME

May Wisdom find me.
May Enlightenment guide me.
May I be marinated in Serenity, day and night.
May my Confidence and Humility learn to get along.

May my weaknesses become my strengths.
May Anxiety be transformed into Enthusiasm,
Obsessiveness into Endurance, Sadness into Serenity
Restlessness into Motivation, and Distraction into Imagination.

May I love myself as I love my neighbor.
May I be aware and accepting of whatever Love is offered to me.
May my Expectations of others dissolve in Mindfulness that they, too,
      are learning how to give and accept Love; and they may be repeating a grade.

May I notice the absence of physical pain, as well its presence.
May my pain remind me of the agony Christ quietly accepted for me.
May it serve as my offering on behalf of one of the multitude of Innocents
      who are suffering today from Hunger, Disease, Injustice, Oppression and Abuse.*

May I never forget that I am a Child of God.
May I have Faith in Him to match his Faith in Me.
May I realize that I do not have to earn His Guidance, Protection and Love.
May I muster enough Courage, each day, to show up for the Life He has planned for me.

*Even as I write this, the pain in my feet subsides considerably, replaced by warmth and a gentle tingling. I hope this means my offering was accepted -- and I wonder who and where is the beneficiary.

PONDERING LIFE AFTER DEATH and RAMBLING ON about it, too.

PONDERING

Will there be Life after Death?
Will we find God or Nothing?
We need not fear -- it doesn't matter.
A difference without a distinction.

If there is no afterlife, we won't know it.
If there is, it is beyond knowing,
at least until we get there.
What's the difference between unknown and unknowable?

Two questions,
but just one answer.
One Truth.
One.

RAMBLING ON

We've heard it again and again,
this same answer to many other questions:

"I am the Alpha and the Omega"
"In the end, there can be only One."
"E Pluribus Unum."
"One, singular sensation ..."
"Om."
"We get to carry each other.
      One. One."
One.
"What's so hard about that?

A SONG of THANKS

Thank you for the Dawning
  of one more newborn Day.
For the Innocence of Morning
  and Fog that burns away.

Thank you for the Sunshine,
  the Warmth of Afternoon.
The Stillness of the Evening,
  the Brilliance of the Moon.

Sometime after Midnight,
  I’ll choose one distant Star,
And ponder in the shivering light
  what Miracles we are.


Note:  I plan to write a refrain and set this to music.

A QUIVER of PRAYERS*

This is just an advance promo
for yet another new collection of poems,
destined never to be completed.
The theme this time is “prayers”.
May God have mercy on my soul.

I seldom pray with words.
God already knows the situation here ~
and the odds are (7 to 5)
that He’s going to give us what we need
rather than what we want, anyway.

Thus, most of my praying,
even the majority of my music,
regardless of what the lyrics say,
is more like a Vulcan Mind-Meld
than a Vatican Message with a Nihil Obstat.

Nonetheless, language-based prayer is poetry.
So, I do write some LBP on occasion;
but I really don’t expect that the Vatican
will be adding new beads to rosaries,
at least not any time soon.

EVOLUTION

Evolution is nothing more
than God taking very small steps.
Intelligent design is just taking time.
God hasn't finished creating us yet.
Thy Will be done on earth,
little by little.
When You're eternal,
always have been
and always will be,
There's really no need to hurry.

GOD'S IMAGE and MAN'S IMAGINATION

The Good Book says God created Man in His own image and likeness.
Man returned the favor -- and Michelangelo notarized it
by creating a corporeal image of the Creator, as well as for Adam.
Scripture is still assumed to refer to bodies rather than souls.

Life then imitated Art; and millions more made the same wrong turn.
Man's imagination tends to be limited by his senses.
Even a genius, in the role of artist, has this limitation. Besides,
the fussy old pope probably demanded a picture he could see.

God is a whole lot bigger than our little brains can imagine.
The Universe, His creation, is not merely what it appears to be.
Neither are we. There is much we don't know about ourselves.
Of that we can be certain, humbly confident of our ignorance.

REALITY

Reality is, more or less, the Will of God.
Our Free Will accounts for the "less".
Nothing is anything,
if (or unless) God wills it,
or at least allows it.
So...
I can do anything I wish, God willing.
Conversely, without God, I can do nothing.
Sometimes, God lets me do nothing.
He doesn't expect me to do anything!
Isn't that something?

BE STILL ~ Based on Psalm 46, more or less

There is nothing in the world that resembles God so much as silence.

~ Meister Eckhart (1260-1328)

Be still and know that I am God

Be still and know

Be still

be

b

...