AN EPISCOPALIAN SPEAKS OF MYSTERY AT CHRISTMAS
Ron Starbuck – Saint Julian Press – ©  December 23, 2022

Of the Father's Heart Begotten
 
Every poet and writer I know has a story to tell and tells their story through the formation of personal mythology. As we travel through life, our life changes.  Our identity shifts, and our sense of who we are as a person turns with the seasons of events and people who enter that life.
 
This is the impermanence of the self, which Buddhist philosophy teaches. It is a vital theme and awareness at work throughout and within Pratītyasamutpāda — Dependent Arising — Interbeing. In Buddhist thought, Being – Becoming – Existence: The infinite possibilities of all things held within creation and how everything in creation depends upon everything else.

“If this exists, that exists; if this ceases to exist, that also ceases to exist.”
 
Buddhism directs us toward the concept of Sunyata–Nirvana–Emptiness–Openness, celebrated in the Heart Sutra. The general principle of pratityasamutpada is complementary to the concept of emptiness (sunyata). Buddhist thought on impermanence teaches us that our sense of self as permanent is false and limited since we are ever-evolving and our lives are ever-changing and dynamic. The self, whom we actively identify with, is empty of such permanence. We are not the same person we were a year ago, twenty years ago, or before. Buddhism refers to this impermanence-illusion or false association as not–self, or no–self, anatta (uhn-uht-tah). It is an ego-clinging self, leading to suffering, misperceptions, selfishness, hubris, and deceitful projections.
 
In the Christian tradition, there is a similar concept, kenosis, the Greek word for emptiness. Kenosis is ‘self–emptying’ one’s own will in becoming receptive to the divine, to be in unity and union with the divine. Christ emptied himself to become a servant of all humankind (Philippians 2:5-11), as revealed in the devotional language and poetry of the scriptures and this ancient hymn. We empty or let go of the self to emulate Christ and become servants to humanity.

       
       Of the Father's Heart Begotten
        Divinum Mysterium – Aurelius Prudentius

       He assumed this mortal body,
       Frail and feeble, doomed to die,
       That the race from dust created,
       Might not perish utterly,
       Which the dreadful Law had sentenced
       In the depths of hell to lie,
       Evermore and evermore.

Translation by Roby Furley Davis
for The English Hymnal (1906)
 
Both heaven and nirvana are alike when we understand them as a spiritual path towards non-duality, to this union with the ultimate divine mystery of God from which all things arise. Creation is ever-expanding and evolving.
 
In a poem, the poet goes through multiple stages and feelings, crafting their words together until the poem ends.  As any poet knows, the poem is never quite finished.  It is almost always incomplete in some sense.  The poet has to let go of it and trust that the creative process goes on within the people who may read their humble efforts.
 
I offer this thought in a spirit of humility.  All our works as poets and writers are a continuation of other works that came before us, the voices of humanity passed down from one generation to another.
 
We are simple gatherers, gathering from those poets, writers, and storytellers who came before us. Even the greatest among us have been inspired by learning and reading the literary works of humankind.  And we, we humble few, are following in their footsteps.  There is something more going on, of course.
 
Each poem begins in silence, stillness, emptiness, an open place waiting to be filled, on a blank page, or as an even deeper divine memory.  And we, we are total participants in its creation.  There is a more profound mystery at work here, an inspiration.  To be creatively inspired is to be filled by the spirit of something more, something beyond the mundane and ourselves.
 
Please let me share this thought with you.  As much as any poem you write is your work, it is also not yours.  You have been inspired. You have heard the whispering of the gods, of God, or the muses of antiquity.  And now you are modestly returning to humankind the voices spoken before in a newer voice.
 
There are no accidents in life, merely a continuation of one life into and with another, in a continuation of consciousness grounded in the divine. Grounded in the great mystery of creation, we cannot quite name it, written within us.  The Holy Spirit may pray in and with us when we do not know how to pray.
 
The words you speak or write are not your own; they have been fashioned before. They abide and rest in a universal divine consciousness and spirit that dwell within us each. They were written upon your soul, deep within your core, heart, and mind, long ago.
 
And now, you have been inspired to return them to humankind in healing for humanity.  The poet within you has heeded the stillness and silence of creation deeply. From such a listening comes a word, a verse, a poem. Each poem is composed as an act of creation, a loving act of giving, healing, and repairing the world.
 
Let me leave you, please, with these opening words from the Gospel of John, with an understanding that they, too, are a poetic metaphor and a symbol pointing us toward a more profound mystery in which we reside and that dwells within us.
 
The Word Became Flesh

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4 in him was life,[a] and the life was the light of all people. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. – (NRSV, Anglicised)
 
You, too, are this light.
 
And then there is this great Christmas Carol that touches on the Mystery of Christ. Why did God come in human form to serve humankind with an open and humble heart, to empty himself? This is one answer in the Anglican Spiritual tradition's mystical language and poetry.
 
Of the Father's Heart Begotten, alternatively known as Of the Father's Love Begotten, is a Christmas carol based on the Latin poem Corde natus by the Roman poet Aurelius Prudentius.

​
Of the Father's Heart Begotten
~ Divinum Mysterium – Aurelius Prudentius~

Translation by Roby Furley Davis
for The English Hymnal (1906)
 
Of the Father's heart begotten,
Ere the world from chaos rose,
He is Alpha, from that Fountain
All that is and hath been flows;
He is Omega, of all things,
Yet to come the mystic Close,
Evermore and evermore.

By His Word was all created
He commanded and 'twas done;
Earth and sky and boundless ocean,
Universe of three in one,
All that sees the moon's soft radiance,
All that breathes beneath the sun,
Evermore and evermore. 

He assumed this mortal body,
Frail and feeble, doomed to die,
That the race from dust created,
Might not perish utterly,
Which the dreadful Law had sentenced
In the depths of hell to lie,
Evermore and evermore.

O how blest that wondrous birthday,
When the Maid the curse retrieved,
Brought to birth mankind's salvation
By the Holy Ghost conceived,
And the Babe, the world's Redeemer
In her loving arms received,
Evermore and evermore.

Sing, ye heights of heaven, his praises;
Angels and Archangels, sing!
Wheresoe’er ye be, ye faithful,
Let your joyous anthems ring,
Every tongue his name confessing,
Countless voices answering,
Evermore and evermore.

This is He, whom seer and sibyl
Sang in ages long gone by,;
This is He of old revealed
In the page of prophecy;
Lo! He comes the promised Saviour;
Let the world his praises cry!
Evermore and evermore.

Hail! Thou Judge of souls departed;
Hail! of all the living King!
On the Father's right hand throned,
Through his courts thy praises ring,
Till at last for all offences
Righteous judgement thou shalt bring,
Evermore and evermore.

Now let old and young uniting
Chant to thee harmonious lays
Maid and matron hymn Thy glory,
Infant lips their anthem raise,
Boys and girls together singing
With pure heart their song of praise,
Evermore and evermore.

Let the storm and summer sunshine,
Gliding stream and sounding shore,
Sea and forest, frost and zephyr,
Day and night their Lord alone;
Let creation join to laud thee
Through the ages evermore,
Evermore and evermore.


Of The Father's Heart Begotten (Sir David Willcocks) Ely Cathedral Choir

To Be ~ Fully Human & Fully Divine
 

If you grew up celebrating Christmas, as I did, one of the questions you may have asked yourself as you grew older is who is Jesus to you now?  And even if you were not raised as a Christian and practice another faith or follow another spiritual tradition, this is still a good question to ask.
 
I believe it needs to be a more profound question and answer than what you may have been taught as a small child in Sunday school.  And it begins with the story of the Nativity, with the Christ child born in a manger and watched over by an ox and ass.
 
There is a beautiful aspect to Jesus we so often forget and don’t focus on, as much as we ought, the humanity of Jesus. The story of Christmas is only the beginning.
 
The story begins with Jesus, as the Incarnate Word and First Born of Creation, who emptied himself, being born in human likeness and form, and all this means.
 
O Come, O Come, Emmanuel, God with Us.

To be human is to be vulnerable. To be human is to endure pain and suffering. To be human is to discover love. To be human is to learn forgiveness. To be human is to live for others as much as for ourselves. To be human is the gift of life. To be human is to live our lives, and to live them fully.
 
When we see Jesus as fully human and divine, it is “meet and right” to stress his humanity as much as his divinity. As found in the words of the Sursum Corda, Latin for “Lift up your hearts" or to have our "Hearts lifted" in the opening dialogue to the Preface of the Eucharistic Prayer.
 
Eucharistic Prayer
 
                   The Lord be with you.
People        And with thy spirit.
Celebrant    Lift up your hearts.
People        We lift them up unto the Lord.
Celebrant    Let us give thanks unto our Lord God.
People        It is meet and right so to do.


And come to understand that the gift of Christmas is transformational because ultimately, this gift opens up to the People of God an indwelling of the Holy Spirit.  However, you may see the Spirit at work in your own life.
 
As fully human as we are, it opens us up to an indwelling of "God the Father" as Divine Mystery, an indwelling of Christ and the Spirit, and it awakens our fullest human potential to love.
 
The literature of scripture and liturgy, the poetry, psalms, parables, images, and symbols of all our sacred stories and liturgies are pointing us towards a way of understanding the Divine Mystery that cannot easily be named or wholly described.
 
These stories are intended to be internalized, to stretch our imaginations, to help suspend our sense of disbelief, to believe in something beyond ourselves, to teach and reveal the truth, to see beyond the story into a deeper and richer mystery that is true, which is real at the inmost levels of the self and soul.
 
To see beyond our earthly sight, to see with insight the invisible and unseen power of God at work within the world. The Holy Spirit at work within the world. To see God’s love actively at work in our lives and the lives of others, transforming creation.
 
God as a Verb; God as Spirit; God as Truth; God as Divine Mystery; God as Love; God as an Indwelling of the Spirit within each and every one of us in this world. God as InterBeing (Thich Nhat Hanh), and God as the "Connecting Spirit" to paraphrase theologian Paul F. Knitter, as an interconnection that flows in and with and through all creation, bringing us into a relationship with one another.
 
​

In My Father’s House are Many Mansions, will be a new book of poetry and prose I hope to begin writing and gathering together soon. The collection will include updated contemporary sermons originally written by my father, accented with other art, poetry, and prose written as an artistic response.  There is likewise a third book of poetry waiting to be gathered together, placed in order, and eventually published.

My father, Robert P. Starbuck, M.Div., PhD, was a practicing psychotherapist for over 40 years and a Protestant clergy for over 50 years.  Through him and my mother, I learned to love and value literature, plays, philosophy, and theology in many forms. The book’s title of course is drawn from the Gospel of John.

John 14:2 ~ 21st Century King James Version: In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.

Every book and every poem tell a story, and have a story hidden between the words and verses within each poem. This is a small part of one book’s story. The story of each poem would take pages and pages that I will not reveal to you here today.  This piece is not about a new book or an old book, it is about the mystery of relationships.

In early 2013, Saint Julian Press published When Angels Are Born, my second book of poetry. The timing was far from perfect and we never really had time to actively promote the book or seek book reviews. A few excellent reviews were written. Ones I am certainly proud to share, written by fellow poets and artists, Adele Kenny, Lois P. Jones, Gayle Greenlea, and Leila A. Fortier.

At the time, my mother was in ICU, recovering from a serious case of pneumonia that she had developed during the Christmas holidays.  She was literally in the hospital and recovery for many weeks.  My father and other members of our immediate family were there by her side every day, every step of the way.

My father in particular was emotionally and physically exhausted, he was so very afraid of losing her, we all were.  In early February, she was eventually able to come home, but her full recovery was weeks, actually months away.  I suspect that at some microscopic and internal level all this took a terrible toll on my father who was 86 years young, and his immune system.  We can never know for certain.

In late February, after being ill himself off and on for a few weeks, we took him to the emergency room at Methodist Hospital in the Texas Medical Center here in Houston.  What they diagnosed was acute myeloid leukemia. Within two weeks, after an initial of round of moderate chemotherapy that was devastating, he was gone.  His eighty six year old body simply gave out on him. My entire family was overwhelmed with grief, we are all close, and we were all close to my father.

I am very thankful and grateful that he was able to see and read a copy of When Angels Are Born.  To see and understand the work and what I was trying to share with the world. Dad was one of my leading enthusiasts, he was always encouraging and something more.  He saw, as I was beginning to see, something being revealed about me as a person, something that had always been there, the actualization of a hidden dream and deepest calling of the soul. 

So much of the work coming from what he and my mother had taught me to appreciate and value throughout my childhood and beyond as an adult who was drawn to great writing and spiritual views from an interfaith dialogue that I had been involved in for many years; drawing on that knowledge deeply and perhaps an even higher creative-consciousness when writing the poems.

When reading the back cover blurbs and endorsements generously provide by poet and actress Hélène Cardona; theologian Paul F. Knitter, who at the time was the Paul Tillich Professor of Theology, World Religions and Culture, and a leading theologian of religious pluralism at Union Theological Seminary in Manhattan, NYC; and Fr. Laurence Freeman the Director of the World Community for Christian Meditation centered in London. He commented that these are great individuals.

He knew of Paul and Fr. Laurence’s work and writings well, because I had shared their books with him and written about them both for Parabola Magazine two years earlier.  And he knew how they are both instrumental in encouraging a radical openness and acceptance in a global interfaith dialogue. My father loved Parabola Magazine, and was proud of the Tangents I had written and the relationship I had as friends and spiritual teachers with both men that aided that endeavor.

My father was equally enamored and charmed by the intelligence, scholarship, and talents of poet and actress Hélène Cardona. Hélène is not only a very talented poet and actress, but also a Henry James scholar with a Master’s in American Literature from the Sorbonne in Paris. She writes and translates in English, French and Spanish, and is also fluent in German, Italian and Greek. As an anam cara (soul friend) she helped me enormously with the final edits for When Angels Are Born. 

My gratitude for the support and encouragement of Hélène, Paul, Fr. Laurence, and my father can never be adequately expressed, such gratefulness goes beyond all words, as does my appreciation for everyone who wrote a review or offered a kind and sincere comment. What is hidden here is another story, perhaps for another time.  But, it might help for you to know that before 2010, I had never met or had a conversation with Hélène, Paul, or Fr. Laurence.

In finally reading When Angels Are Born, I think my father was simply astounded at the work and its quality, as perhaps other members of my immediate family were as well.  This was not the son, brother, or uncle they had known all their lives.  It was something very new, very different, something they didn't quite recognize and had to adjust to in their mental images. As did I in my own sense of self and identity, trying to maintain a simple humility of spirit and thanksgiving; it takes time you see. 

I suspect that for some, adjustments are still going on today.  Our families and closest friends, the people who have known us for years and years, know us at a completely different level than we are known professionally, or as poets and writers.  An echo perhaps of, no prophet (or poet) is truly seen or known in his own long-standing society of family and friends. They know your faults too well, and love you in spite of them all.

Why am I thinking of this today? Because, within the last year, presently, and in the very near future I have been and will continue to work with at least four poets in publishing their first books through Saint Julian Press.

Last fall we published Fred LaMotte’s first book of poems titled Wounded Bud. The most recent one is I Ate the Cosmos for Breakfast by Melissa Studdard. The newest one to be published in November 2014 is Numinous by Leila A. Fortier.  There are at least two or three more books by other poets we’ll be working on through the winter and spring.

Every day I am a witness to the utter miracle of this process, and the very hard work it takes day in and day out. Every day is a reminder and in many ways a remembrance of where it all began.

It began with my mother writing poems when we were children, and then my father sharing them in a sermon. It began when I was a very small boy and heard my first nursery rhyme or fairy tale. It began when I heard my father recite a Robert Frost or Carl Sandburg poem, or parts of a Tennessee Williams, William Inge, or Arthur Miller play, and so many other brilliant poets and playwrights. And it began with some of the teachers who encouraged in me an appreciation for the arts, literature, drama, and the spoken word.

It begins also with my wife Joanne, my soul-mate in this life we share together, and the many friendships and relationships we share with others.  Certainly through our involvement at Trinity Episcopal Church in Midtown Houston, where we were married, still attend, and are actively involved.  And in many other relationships too, surprising in their spiritual intimacy, and with all the people who have and will be touched by Saint Julian Press. The human spirit and Holy Spirit are boundless, calling us into new relationships every day.

I am astounded at the relationships we have in this world, how unexpectedly doors will open, and how new people and close friendships arise out of the mystery of creation.  There is a conversation I recall once with Paul Knitter over a dinner when I was visiting him at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. 

In it we spoke of the marvelous interconnections that form between people and how they often arise and form.  In his book, Without Buddha I Could Not Be a Christian, in writing about Thich Nhat Hanh’s idea of “interbeing,” Paul tells us that understanding God through relationships is critical and that the source and power of our relationships is driven by the presence of the "Holy Spirit."

If I may paraphrase Paul, the importance of this concept is summarized by this: “behind and within all the different images and symbols we may use for God – Creator, Redeemer, Word, Spirit, - the most fundamental, the deepest truth we can speak of God is that God is the source and power of our relationships."

I think this is true in all faiths, with all of life.  We may call it by another name or use another metaphor or image if you wish, but for me it is simply a mystery, or a very intimate divine memory that draws us to one another. I can easily live in that mystery, accept it fully and watch it be revealed fully in and with and through all of you as our lives unfold together.

Many Blessings,

Ron Starbuck

October 12, 2014

Book Review Hyperlinks

1)     Tiferet Journal by Adele Kenney – July 2013

2)     The Loch Raven Review by Lois P. Jones

3)     Leila A. Fortier ~ March 31, 2014

4)     Gayle J. Greenlea ~ February 14, 2014


Notes & Links

When Angels Are Born

Hélène Cardona is a poet, actor, linguist, literary translator, dream analyst, author of Dreaming My Animal Selves (Salmon Poetry), winner of the Pinnacle Book Award and the 2014 Readers’ Favorite Award in Poetry; The Astonished Universe (Red Hen Press); and Life in Suspension, forthcoming from Salmon Poetry in 2016. Ce que nous portons (Éditions du Cygne), her translation of What We Carry by Dorianne Laux, came out in September 2014. She also translated Beyond Elsewhere by Gabriel Arnou-Laujeac. 

Hélène holds a Masters in English & American Literature from the Sorbonne, taught at Hamilton College & Loyola Marymount University, and received fellowships from the Goethe-Institut & Universidad Internacional de Andalucía. 

She is Main Editor of Dublin Poetry Review and Levure Littéraire, and a multiple-time Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee. Other publications include Washington Square, World Literature Today, Poetry International, The Warwick Review, The Dublin Review of Books, The Irish Literary Times, The Los Angeles Review, and many more.

Acting credits include Chocolat, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, Mad Max: Fury Road, The Hundred-Foot Journey, X-Men: Days of Future Past, etc. For Serendipity, she co-wrote with director Peter Chelsom and composer Alan Silvestri the song Lucienne, which she also sang.

http://www.helenecardona.com
http://www.pw.org/content/helene_cardona
http://www.imdb.me/helenecardona

 

Paul F. Knitter - Without Buddha I Could Not Be a Christian, Oneworld Publications

http://www.amazon.com/Without-Christian-published-Oneworld-Publications/dp/B00E31Q4OI/

Union Theological Seminary Biography - Paul Tillich Professor of Theology, World Religions and Culture

http://www.utsnyc.edu/paulknitter

Union in Dialogue:  http://unionindialogue.org/2011/06/05/the-miracle-of-mindfulness-and-the-miracle-of-being-in-christ-jesus/

Fr. Laurence Freeman

First Sight: The Experience of Faith
http://www.amazon.com/First-Sight-Experience-Laurence-Freeman/dp/1441161570/

WCCM site:  http://www.wccm.org/content/laurence-freeman-osb

There is Something About Being an Episcopalian (Anglican)

If you haven’t seen this new video on YouTube, I would like to encourage you take a moment to watch and share it if you wish.  It is a witness and a testament on being an Episcopalian within the Anglican Communion, and a Sacramental Christian within the Church Universal.  

As a contemplative tradition and prayerful path, as a way towards a knowledge and understanding of God, by whom we are fully known in and with and through an indwelling of the Spirit.  And how God as the “Connecting Spirit" calls us into relationship with one another and all of creation.

Corinthians 13 (NRSV) ~ 12 For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.

It is no secret that I love what the Episcopal Church and Anglican Communion have to offer as an open inclusive boundless community of loving-kindness, and as a transforming faith and spiritual practice within the world.  In our beautiful liturgy, the work of the people, and as sacred art, literature, and poetry that is transforming, an invocation of the Holy Spirit.  

As I love how the Holy Spirit is actively at work within the world, as a divine presence and mystery, formless ~ without form, unseen and invisible, unbound, eternally open, indwelling, and transforming; God as a verb, acting to transform creation, in a world without end.


Romans 8 (NRSV) ~ 26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. 27 And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.


Transforming our lives and creation if we will only open ourselves up to the peace, power, and joy we find in a relationship with and in and through Christ.  And the hope Christ offers to a weary world through the gift of the Holy Spirit. Even as the Holy Spirit prays within us when we do not know how to truly pray ourselves to God, with God, invisible and unseen, indwelling and always present.


John14 (NRSV) ~ 26 But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you. 27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.


To be reminded is to remember, in Eucharistic remembrance. In remembrance of Christ. To remember whom we are as Children of God, as a People of God, living in community with one another and helping to heal and repair the world. Tikkun Olam.

Allow me to end this note please, with this beautiful and ancient liturgical poem and invocation of the Holy Spirit written by the Eastern Christian Orthodox monk, Symeon the New Theologian, over a thousand years ago.  

Within these words, I find a connection to many other contemplative traditions and faiths, in an interfaith dialogue, that touches on the mystery and formlessness of the divine.  Symeon uses a Christian vocabulary, but his words are timeless and eternal.

Words that may take us beyond all our images and symbols of God, the Divine Ultimate Mystery.  Seeing God as the “Connecting Spirit” as my friend and theologian Paul F. Knitter has written and spoken of in his books and teaching.

Symeon the New Theologian's Invocation to the God, the Holy Spirit

Come, true light.
Come, life eternal.
Come, hidden mystery.
Come, treasure without name.
Come, reality beyond all words.
Come, person beyond all understanding.
Come, rejoicing without end.
Come, light that knows no evening.
Come, unfailing expectation of the saved.
Come, raising of the fallen.
Come, resurrection of the dead.
Come, all-powerful, for unceasingly you create, refashion and change all things by your will alone.
Come, invisible whom none may touch and handle.
Come, for you continue always unmoved, yet at every instant you are wholly in movement; you draw near to us who lie in hell, yet you remain higher than the heavens.
Come, for your name fills our hearts with longing and is ever on our lips; yet who you are and what your nature is, we cannot say or know.
Come, Alone to the alone.
Come, for you are yourself the desire that is within me.
Come, my breath and my life.
Come, the consolation of my humble soul.
Come, my joy, my glory, my endless delight.


Many Blessings,
Ron Starbuck


Saint Julian Press ~ The Poem:  http://www.saintjulianpress.com/there-is-something-about-being-an-episcopalian.html

God the Connecting Spirit ~ Third Recording with Paul F. Knitter

http://www.saintjulianpress.com/paul-f-knitter---interview.html