excerpts, "Opening the Bible"

The New Testament asserts that the full manifestation of God is in fact a self-emptying (kenosis) in which God becomes man and even submits to death at the hands of men... The word of God is now not only event but person, and the entire meaning and content of the Bible is to be found, say the Apostles, not in the message about Christ but it an encounter with Christ, who is at once person and word of God and who lives as the Risen Lord. The fulness of the Bible is, then (for Christians), the personal encounter with Christ Jesus in which one recognizes him as "the one who is sent" (the Messiah or anointed Lord, Kyrios Christos). He contains in himself all the questions and all the answers, all the hope and all the meanings, all the problems and all the solutions. To become utterly committed to this person and to share in the event which is his coming, his death, and his resurection is to find the meaning of existence, not by figuring it out but by living it as he did.

--Thomas Merton

excerpts, Spleen

And Life, a little bald and gray,
Languid, fastidious, and bland,
Waits, hat and gloves in hand,
Punctilious of tie and suit,
(Somewhat impatient of delay)
On the doorstep of the Absolute.

---

T.S. Eliot

excerpts, Across the Universe

Words are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup,
They slither while they pass, they slip away across the universe
Pools of sorrow, waves of joy are drifting through my opened mind,
Possessing and caressing me.

Images of broken light which dance before me like a million eyes,
That call me on and on across the universe,
Thoughts meander like a restless wind inside a letter box they
Tumble blindly as they make their way
Across the universe

Sounds of laughter shades of earth are ringing
Through my open ears inciting and inviting me
Limitless undying love which shines around me like a
Million suns, it calls me on and on

Across the universe

Nothings gonna change my world.

---
John Lennon