What Good is the Church?

Two of the world's most cherished Christian teachers discuss the role and relevance of the Church in the modern world, and how it was originally created in order to preserve the teachings of Christ--with the singular purpose of helping to bring people into the exact same relationship with God that Christ himself had, leading humanity into a space that is truly both "fully human and fully divine."

While much of this teaching has been lost in the fog of religious fundamentalism over the centuries, the spirit of this core intention continues to thrive in such beautiful souls as Father Thomas and Brother David, both of whom bring extraordinary humor, grace, and love to a very difficult (and controversial) topic.

The discussion uses some terminology from Spiral Dynamics, a system of measuring different value systems as they unfold in human consciousness. Here is a brief summary, including Ken Wilber's current names for some of these levels:

Beige: Archaic-instinctive—survivalistic/automatic/reflexological * From 100,000 BC on * "Express self to meet imperative physiological needs through instincts of Homo sapiens."

Purple (or Magenta): Animistic-tribalistic magical-animistic Tribal order * From 50,000 BC on * "Sacrifice to the ways of the elders and customs as one subsumed in group."

Red: Egocentric-exploitive power gods/dominionist * From 7000 BC on * "Express self (impulsively) for what self desires without guilt and to avoid shame."

Blue (or Amber): Absolutistic-obedience mythic order—purposeful/authoritarian * From 3000 BC on * "Sacrifice self for reward to come through obedience to rightful authority in purposeful Way."

Orange: Multiplistic-achievist scientific/strategic * From 1000 AD on (as early as 600 AD according to Graves and Calhoun) * "Express self (calculatedly) to reach goals and objectives without rousing the ire of important others."

Green: Relativistic-personalistic—communitarian/egalitarian * From 1850 AD on (surged in early 20th century) * "Sacrifice self interest now in order to gain acceptance and group harmony."

Yellow (or Teal): Systemic-integrative * From 1950s on * "Express self for what self desires, but to avoid harm to others so that all life, not just own life, will benefit."

Turquoise: Holistic * From 1970s on * A sacrifice self-interest system which is still forming

For more about Spiral Dynamics and other measurements of Altitude, please see www.holons-news.com/altitudes

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• Integral
• Naked
• Christianity
• Spirituality
• Father
• Thomas
• Keating
• Brother
• David
• Steindl-Rast
• Church
• Spiral
• Dynamics

[smallpotatoes989]

These guys after all stupidity of fondumentalists realy convinced me to go to church again

[cdphatty]

can anyone tell me where this is from? these are like my two favorite people lol

[greenrate]

@playbak

Good question. One way this might happen . . . is if you decide you really want to get good at women, fast cars, or video games.

You'll find . . . that "thinking" will always leave you at a comparatively superficial level of competence with them.

To get good . . you need instead to learn to BE one with them, reacting to them from a deeper, less distraction-prone part of yourself.

Spiritual practice is the ultimate means of learning how to do that.

[playbak]

Fr. Thomas is great spiritual person, but as a young adult I have very serious trouble understanding him as it all seems very abstract.

How can I go from thinking about women, fast cars, and video games to truly believing I've found God in me?

I do not understand how to "un-distract" myself

[JoeJacari]

And Christ said, "Thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build my Church. And the gates of hell shall not ultimately prevail over it."

The Church offers the Perpetual Sacrifice and channels of supernatural Grace (Sacraments).

We need the institution because it is the only effective Geo-religious organization capable of counterbalancing the great evils of our time and all times: Nazism, Communism, radical Islam, materialism run amok, abortion, Marxism, the new world order, etc.

[hush2088]

Church/and or religion is possibly the biggest waste of time, energy and cause of wars etc. Having said that, Jesus and God (in the Christian sense) are totally real and powerful beyond our imagination. Most religions guess the answers 'where we came from' 'what's the purpose to life' etc. there is no answer, humans do not have the answer in this life form as we know it. There are lots of 'Holy' and 'nice' people on the planet but there are lots of fakers as well. Personal intuition is the key.

[LooksAeterna]

The Eucharist is the genuine article, after all. Without some contemplative practise, perhaps most people cannot sense that so easily.

[LooksAeterna]

@Avonaco76 Having admitted this attitude, rejecting all possession of the truth by verbal codification, a rather famous old priest here STILL gave me my first communion because I had asked for it, feeling a deep desire to be ceremonially connected this way in Christ.

[LooksAeterna]

@Avonaco76 Me too. I have a funny and unique relationshop to Catholicism: I am not formally a member and probably the most apophatic sadhak around when it comes to an analysis of the matter (I even analyze to pieces buddhist analyses !), and yet I enjoy all positive poetry regarding the ultimate as long as it admits to being poetic.

[SalusNovus]

@decoymiata u make a good point, but listening to these guys talk, they talk about religion in a very open minded way. its nice to hear people who have faith talk and 'discuss' rather than 'argue' about how christianity is like the be-all and end-all of religions (for example) - im an atheist, and i guess im just trying to say discussions like this are a breath of fresh air :)