Picking up a pen, taking a walk, and the image of a black hole

As Christians move toward Holy Week –  the celebration of the last supper, foot washing, bread and wine turned to body and blood – my own attention turns to the incarnate, away from infinity to the here and now.  I contend that, yes, it’s just-passed as Edmond Husserl pointed out.  Yet it’s what we have, who we are, very bodily creatures that laugh and eat and cry with bones that break.

The very bodily existence that is ours is our way to a consciousness that we also have infinite life.

The way I got there is not just thinking about Jesus; I also eat the bread, drink the wine, and in some very real way (it’s talked about as ‘transubstantiation’) this is Jesus.

It’s the petit mort, the little death as the French refer to an orgasm, that is as good as it gets.  It is truth, if not ultimate truth.  Incarnate.

It can also be as bad as it is because it can be so good and sometimes isn’t.  The churches get packed on Good Friday.  Sometimes church attendance is greater on Good Friday than on Easter, and I guess it’s small wonder.  It’s not a stretch for many people to believe we’d kill an innocent, and in a courageous death (because surely Jesus could have avoided the cross, could have got away) we stand there stripped, ourselves, naked.  Feeling sad, vulnerable and stupid.

So when I take a walk, when I pick up a pen instead of my laptop, new ideas come and old memories float through my mind.  This is not true every week, but it is certainly Holy Week.

And as I prepare, there’s this.

 

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