You and I are the force for transformation in the world. We are the consciousness that will define the nature of the reality we are moving into.
- Ram Dass -
A personal blog by a graying (mostly Anglo with light African-American roots) gay left leaning liberal progressive married college-educated Buddhist Baha'i BBC/NPR-listening Professor Emeritus now following the Dharma in Minas Gerais, Brasil.
You and I are the force for transformation in the world. We are the consciousness that will define the nature of the reality we are moving into.
- Ram Dass -
Buddhism
teaches us that all shapes and forms are impermanent; they come and go.
Truly realizing this phenomenon also involves understanding that nothing in awareness is lost.
—Haemin Sunim, "Nothing Is Outside of Awareness"
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Hearing is when we listen to or read the teachings, and it’s where the metabolic process begins—your first bite. Meditating is when we sit with what we have heard and metabolize the teachings.
—Andrew Holecek, “The Lost Art of Contemplation”
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TODAY'S GAY WISDOM
The Adelphopoieia Rite of the Roman Catholic Church
In 1994 John Boswell published a book—Same Sex Unions in Pre-Modern Europe (New York: Villard, 1994) which claimed, essentially, that the adelphopoiia rite known to have been used in Orthodox and Greek rite Catholic Churches constituted, in usage at least, a form of ecclesiastical blessing for homosexual unions. To say the least this claim has been highly contested. Boswell was not able to show that any high church body gave approval to such a use of the rite, but was able to show, as most critics allow, that the rite was both fairly widespread [he had about 70 manuscripts], and that it probably was used by some same-sex couples to give some outward sign to their relationship.
There are contrary indications about the entire ceremony. The late 18th century Orthodox law text known as the Pedalion or Rudder does indicate that the ceremony was [ab]used in this way. From a much earlier date, St. Theodore of Studium in his Reform Rules seems to relate the ceremony to marriage. On the other hand, the Life of St. Mary the Younger, which is quite willing to use strong marital imagery about male-male relationships, describes the development of one such relationship, between Mary's brother and a drungarius, in which the couple agree that the bonds of kinship need to be added to their bond of love—and so the drungarius marries Mary. [... this observation [was made] in an unpublished paper, some time ago. Alice Mary Talbot of Dumbarton Oaks strongly doubted that interpretation, but it is supported in the forthcoming translation and commentary on the Life by Angeliki Laiou, also of Dumbarton Oaks.
As well as Boswell, numerous people were interested in this rite. Presented here [1.] are Boswell's translation of one of the various manuscripts he has, and [2.] a version from Jacob Goar's version of the rite, printed in the 17th century, translated by an independent scholar Nicholas Zymaris. Zymaris, who speaks both Greek and some Albanian, has made a number of verbal presentations, and Internet postings, in which he describes having witnessed such ceremonies in modern Albanian usage and which clearly indicate same sex unions.
i. The priest shall place the holy Gospel on the Gospel stand and they that are to be joined together place their right hands on it, holding lighted candles in their left hands. Then shall the priest cense them and say the following:ii. In peace we beseech Thee, O Lord. For heavenly peace, we beseech Thee, O Lord. For the peace of the entire world, we beseech Thee, O Lord. For this holy place, we beseech Thee, O Lord. That these thy servants, N. and N., be sanctified with thy spiritual benediction, we beseech Thee, O Lord. That their love [agape] abide without offense or scandal all the days of their lives, we beseech Thee, O Lord. That they be granted all things needed for salvation and godly enjoyment of life everlasting, we beseech Thee, O Lord. That the Lord God grant unto them unashamed faithfulness [pistis] and sincere love [agape anhypokritos], we beseech Thee, O Lord... Have mercy on us, O God. "Lord, have mercy" shall be said three times.iii The priest shall say: Forasmuch as Thou, O Lord and Ruler, art merciful and loving, who didst establish humankind after thine image and likeness, who didst deem it meet that thy holy apostles Philip and Bartholomew be united, bound one unto the other not by nature but by faith and the spirit. As Thou didst find thy holy martyrs Serge and Bacchus worthy to be united together [adelphoi genesthai], bless also these thy servants, N. and N., joined together not by the bond of nature but by faith and in the mode of the spirit [ou desmoumenous desmi physeis alla pisteis kai pneumatikos tropi], granting unto them peace [eirene] and love [agape] and oneness of mind. Cleanse from their hearts every stain and impurity and vouchsafe unto them to love one other [to agapan allelous] without hatred and without scandal all the days of their lives, with the aid of the Mother of God and all thy saints, forasmuch as all glory is thine.iv. Another Prayer for Same-Sex Union O Lord Our God, who didst grant unto us all those things necessary for salvation and didst bid us to love one another and to forgive each other our failings, bless and consecrate, kind Lord and lover of good, these thy servants who love each other with a love of the spirit [tous pneumatike agape heautous agapesantas] and have come into this thy holy church to be blessed and consecrated. Grant unto them unashamed fidelity [pistis] and sincere love [agape anhypokritos], and as Thou didst vouchsafe unto thy holy disciples and apostles thy peace and love, bestow them also on these, O Christ our God, affording to them all those things needed for salvation and life eternal. For Thou art the light and the truth and thine is the glory.v. Then shall they kiss the holy Gospel and the priest and one another, and conclude.
INTRODUCTION [by Zymaris]
This service is a rite of the Eastern Orthodox Church dating from very early times and assuming its present form between the fourth and ninth centuries AD. This service is translated from the Euchologion of Jacobus Goar, which was printed in 1647 and revised in 1730. A facsimile of the 1730 edition, published in Graz, Austria, in 1960, is the edition available in many theological libraries. With the rising influence of western ideas in recent centuries, this rite ceased to be practiced widely and was largely forgotten or ignored except in isolated areas, most notably Albania and other areas in the Balkans, where it flourished throughout the nineteenth century and up to at least 1935. Both men and women were united with this rite or similar ones.
This rite is called "spiritual" because the relationship between spiritual brothers is not one of blood-relation but of the Holy Spirit, and also to distinguish the rite from blood-brotherhood, which the Church opposed. In the service, the saint-martyrs Sergius and Bacchus are invoked, who were united in spiritual brotherhood "not bound by the law of nature but by the example of faith in the Holy Spirit". These saints were tortured and martyred late in the third century AD. when they refused to worship the emperor's idols. In their biography by Simeon Metaphrastes (available in J.P. Migne, Patrologia Graeca, vol. 115, pp. 1005-1032) they are described as sweet companions and lovers to each other."
"This rite is incorporated into the Divine Liturgy. It begins with the usual blessing and prayers of a Liturgy. During the Great Synapte, petitions for the couple to be united in spiritual brotherhood are added to the usual petitions. After the First Antiphon, two special prayers are said for the couple, after which they kiss the Gospel Book and each other. After the priest sings a hymn, the Liturgy continues at "Have mercy on us, O God.". Accounts of the use of this rite (such as Nacke, _Jahrbuch fuer sexuelle Zwischenstufen_ 9 (1908), 328) confirm that the spiritual brothers receive Holy Communion together, thereby forming the sacramental bond in this union. However, Goar mentions in a footnote that in some manuscripts, the couple is only blessed with holy water."
This text is part of the Internet Medieval Source Book. The Sourcebook is a collection of public domain and copy-permitted texts related to medieval and Byzantine history. Paul Halsall Mar 1996
Through sustaining this nonreactive stance over time, mindful awareness becomes the basis for one’s ethical life.
—Stephen Batchelor, “The Art of Solitude”
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Without
the feeling of separation from the rest of the world, we also lose the
need to strain and stress to be better, more clever, or more
accomplished. We can start to just be.
—Ayya Khema, “The Elemental Self”
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"Faith is in the soul. Belief is thought. Faith is so rich. Faith gives me my spiritual self..."
- Ram Dass -
When we’re in harmony with ourselves, we give a wonderful gift to other people—the gift of trust.
—Joseph Goldstein, “The Evolution of Happiness”
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There’s
no actual happiness to be found in always trying to be someone else at
some future time, because the fact is, you’ll never quite get there. Why
not instead, show up fully, right here, right now?
—Mark Van Buren, “Brief Teachings”
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Nothing
is merely a means to an end, nothing is merely a step on the path to
somewhere else. Every moment, everything, is absolutely foundational in
its own right.
—Barry Magid, “Uselessness”
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PI DAY is a holiday held to celebrate the mathematical constant π (pi). Pi Day is observed on March 14th (3/14), due to π being roughly equal to 3.14. The Pi Minute is also sometimes celebrated on March 14 at 1:59 p.m. If π is truncated to seven decimal places, it becomes 3.1415926, making March 14 at 1:59:26 p.m., Pi Second (or sometimes March 14, 1592 at 6:53:58 a.m.).
The first Pi Day celebration was held at the San Francisco Exploratorium in 1988, with staff and public marching around one of its circular spaces, and then consuming fruit pies; the museum has since added pizza pies to its Pi Day menu.
The founder of Pi Day was Larry Shaw, a now retired physicist at the Exploratorium who still helps out with the celebrations. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology often mails out its acceptance letters to be delivered to prospective students on Pi Day.
Some also celebrate Pi Approximation Day in addition to Pi Day, which can fall on any of several dates:
On Pi Day, 2004, Daniel Tammet calculated and recited 22,514 decimal digits of pi.
Somewhat appropriately, it would seem, Albert Einstein was born on Pi Day, 1879.
From the perspective of Buddhism, staying calm comes from healing our own anger.
—Mindy Newman, “How to Stay Calm in a Raging World”
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