When the Kin-dom Appears Among Us
The Spiral Dance of the Four Paths and the Fall of Babylon
Seeds of the Tree of Life
Behold, the Word of the Holy to the people in Babylon: The seeds of the Tree of Life are sown in the hearts of all living. Some fall on hard ground, but others on soft rich soil where it is easy for them to take root and grow. Yet to all unto whose heart the rains of grace fall, the seed will quicken and the roots break up the hard soil.
The forces of Babylon rush to and fro, intending to crush the trees while they are young and calling them weeds, so tend to the seedlings in the sanctuaries of the heart beyond the reach of darkness to overshadow and trample. Such trees have grown in secret for a long time. They are ready to bear fruit.
These orchards of life grow wherever the Way is practiced, and the Kin-dom shelters under their branches. Through compassion, the rains come. With justice, the rivers of life break forth. They flow through the land healing all they touch. These waters sustain the world, causing life to flourish.
Swirling in many directions, the waters dance down the courses they follow. They turn toward awe and wonder as they fashion a way toward delight. Others whirl into themselves, making space while holding nothing. Sometimes, the waters splash against the bank carving new shapes that change the flow of the river. When the waters hit an obstruction, the waters sweep through to undermine and sweep the obstacles away.
Babylon arises wherever the fearful, the greedy, and the power hungry oppress others so they feel the same alienation from life and they can feed their never ending hunger. Jesus walked in their shadow and shone his light, freeing the rivers of grace to heal the world. The Kin-dom lived in the world before him and flourished after him. It has always been in the world, and always be within it. Wherever the light shines, the darkness cannot overcome it, so be of good cheer. Despair is their weapon to control, dominate, steal, and destroy.
The Light That Cannot Be Forced
The Way is light and life for those who receive it. It carries the Word through the Holy Spirit, and shelters the people in the tent of the Shekhinah until the sanctuaries are built and refuge is offered. The Shekhinah herself covers the faithful heart wherever they roam, keeping them from the temptations of Babylon.
Light shines. Life flows. The Word is spoken. The Shekhinah enshrines. They do not go where they are not invited. Light has a delicate touch and works over time. It cannot force itself on anyone. Life exists within all, and while it may withdraw, it has no power to exert except on those who wish to have it more abundantly. The Word is spoken, but if ignored or unheard, floods past. As for the Shekhinah, she only goes where she is invited and where she chooses to go. Why would she be where she is unbidden and undesired?
Conquest, control, and concentration of power require cruelty and a cold heart. Without them, they cannot dominate, dam, and destroy. Cruelty isolates and cannot hold anything together without fear. A cold heart does not care to have others near it. They know nothing of kinship, unless they twist the word to mean those under their sway. The Kin-dom is not with them.
The Spiral Dance of the Four Paths
In the Kin-dom, the people dance the great spiral dance between the four paths. At one time a foot in one path, then step to another and the dance unfolds and spins round itself in the grand orbit of life.
Via Positiva: Awe and Wonder
Awe and wonder call the exuberance of the first path out. Here the Via Positiva delights in the flow, and savors every step, with and without a partner. Ever remembering that it does not dance alone, God is in everything and everything is in God. It lavishes in the royal personhood of itself and all those with whom it dances, whether they are on the paths or not. It is as hospitable as the earth, welcoming all to the reel.
Awe and wonder are so hard for Babylon to stamp out because they beckon from all around. Babylon paves the ground and blinds the sky with its own light so no one sees the mysteries calling from beyond it. It fills life with toil and turmoil, so people do not have the time or the energy to behold the magnificence all around them.
When people are exhausted and isolated, it is harder for them to savor the delights of life, but it is not impossible. So Babylon whispers its sweet lie, “There is not enough for everyone. You must struggle to capture what you need.”
It is hard to be grateful when achievement of any kind comes at such a great cost, yet gratitude persists through the struggle and strife. Once joy is found, no matter how small, it opens the way for awe and delight to return.
As the people come together for shared meals, they ensure they have enough, and joy, gratitude, and delight take root. It can be in the simplest of things, the sharing of bread, even just in the sharing of the table, that can quicken the soul to life.
Sing and dance together, and let joy take up its voice. Hospitality does not judge the singer, the dancer, or the song. It joins them in the revelry to celebrate the moment.
So much beauty goes unseen in day to day life that could be savored and shared. Be mindful not to miss it. Once we learn to savor even the smallest pleasure, the mystic is born within us, and they cannot help but rejoice in life.
Mystics are dangerous to Babylon, because no chain can hold them from their joy, and no blindness can obscure their vision. They see the world as sacred, and cannot be manipulated easily by fear. All are born with a mystic desiring to dance free. They shatter the hold of Babylon so fresh green growth can rise from the cracks.
Via Negativa: Daring the Dark
Joy is just the beginning. It cannot continue the dance on its own. When awe opens the eyes, the sight is clearer. The chains must be loosened so life may flow on.
Awe and wonder are not blinding. They know their kin, grief and silence are there in the dark waiting. They are not enemies. They are guides in the great dance to carry us through the hard times. Delight opens the way, surrendering to grief so wounds can be tended and healed.
In the dark, the world opens up, even though sometimes it feels closed. In that inky void there is a cosmos flourishing that is just hard to see at the moment. Once we dare the dark, and enter into the profound mysteries there, everything opens up in new and unexpected ways.
For those raised in Babylon, there are many lies that need to be cast off into the dark. Wealth cannot bring salvation, it only greases the wheels so everyone has to run faster not to fall behind. Violence does not create security; it invites harm in return. Domination does not build order, it breeds resistance that will eventually rise against it. Empire is not inevitable, it is an artifice of fear, desire, and cruelty that can only crumble under its own weight.
Once these are swept away, new spaces arise to live in.
Fear and greed are siblings, they are hungers that cannot be satisfied. They worm their way into the soul with the lie that if they are not fed, someone else will feed them and become dominant. This ignores that domination is an illusion, and no one can exercise it over others.
Babylon pretends that power and security can exist without community. They cannot.
When we let go of our fear and allow grief, silence, and emptiness to do their work, we are freed from these insatiable cravings.
Healing Through Grief
Grief invites us to sit so we can heal the mind and heart. It calls us to sit through the long night to take time to adjust to a new reality. When loss enters our lives and impermanence shows its face, we cannot step into the world easily. Memories, habits, and emotions cry out of the old way, when we still had what was lost in our lives.
Grieving is the process of feeling the pain, remembering, talking, crying, and reflecting, which gradually helps us to reorganize those emotional connections. Instead of pretending the loss did not happen, grief lets us face it piece by piece until the memories become less like open wounds and more like stories we carry. In that way the pain is not useless. It is the mind doing careful repair work so we can keep loving what mattered while still continuing our lives.
Formation Through Silence
Silence calls us to keep quiet so we can hear truth again. It introduces us to its friend reflection to help us change our minds because they give us space to examine our own thoughts instead of reacting automatically. When we pause and sit quietly, attention turns inward and we notice our feelings, assumptions, and habits more clearly. We develop our skills of introspection, or reflective self awareness. This kind of reflection helps us understand our motivations, regulate emotions, and reshape beliefs over time.
Mindfulness opens us to stillness that reduces stress reactions, loosens rigid thinking patterns, and strengthens our systems that support thoughtful decision making and emotional regulation. Silence slows the mental noise long enough for the mind to see itself honestly, and that clarity is what allows our beliefs, attitudes, and choices to gradually change.
Opening Through Emptiness
Emptiness teaches us nothing in life is fixed, permanent, or locked into one identity. Everything exists because of many causes and conditions coming together and changing over time. When we realize this, we stop clinging so tightly to things being a certain way, including our own stories about who we are.
Once we loosen our grip, we create space inside the mind and heart, much like clearing a crowded room. In that open space, new ways of thinking, new choices, and new growth can appear. Emptiness is not about nothingness. It is about recognizing that life is flexible and unfinished, which means there is always room for something new to take root and grow.
Meaning and Purpose Arises
Meaning and purpose are not things we simply invent in our heads or chase like objects. They emerge when we learn to pay careful attention to the world and respond to it in a wise and fitting way. When we become more aware, less distracted, and less trapped by ego, we begin to sense what a situation truly calls for.
Purpose grows out of skilled participation in life. By seeing clearly and responding appropriately, meaningful action happens almost naturally, as if we are working with life together rather than struggling against it.
Meaning and purpose arise when we do what we believe matters in a way that makes us feel connected and makes a difference, no matter how great or small. We cannot do this meaning making if we do not dare the dark to empty ourselves of false beliefs, let go of what we do not need to carry, and strengthen through silence and emptying our connections to what matters most to us.
Via Creativa: The Orchard of Life
As we step from the shadowed land of the Via Negativa, the ashen ground gives way to the verdurous fields of the Via Creativa. Our heart beats to the new rhythm of compassion, and our eyes are clearer so we can see beauty as it is. Inspiration takes our hand inviting us to dance into the grand orchard of life to imagine something new.
Our compassion invites us to call others into the dance, and make new experiences for our mutual lives and joy. We join in the communities in the shade of life under the sun of hope, sharing meals and lives with one another.
We sing new songs, dance new dances, and cook new foods. We have conversations that will never happen the same way again.
All living is creative, requiring imagination, hope, and compassion. These drives give rise to artists, teachers, healers, and organizers imagining new ways to live, not just survive.
As compassion and imagination dance together the power of Babylon fades into the background. Mutual aid replaces the old ways of exploitation. Hospitality draws us together to remove isolation from the world. Healing practices restore life, and the greatest healing we need is the reclamation of truth.
Babylon is built on lies. For every lie we laid down when we dared the dark, we need to pick up the ability to speak truth again. Truth telling is a creative and imaginative act.
It is easy to confuse truth with facts. Facts are what is, what was, and what might be, but to fully understand the facts they must be faceted into a story. The relationship between these stories and the way the world really is and behaves is the degree of truth contained within the stories. No story is completely true. Those that distract from or hide the truth are lies. The ones that come closest to the world as it is, we hold as true, but with the knowledge they could always change. Myths are the metaphors we share to get as close as we can to the truths that do not fit well into words. Some truths break when they are put into words.
These stories, from the ones we tell about ourselves to the ones we share about the cosmos, give words to the songs, and shape the dance of life.
Our goal must always be to find the Living Word, and build our communities around them. The Word dies when it is fixed, locked into a rigid form and not allowed to grow or change. If the Word is trapped, it will die. It has to create new songs and dance new dances.
As we join the Living Word in a dance, the world springs to life, ever renewing itself.
Via Transformativa: Restoring the Dance
With the Living Word by our side, we dance into the Via Transformativa. Now, as we encounter the injustice of Babylon, the urge to interfere arises. The joy of the dancers is toxic to the empire, causing it to overreact.
Like the band of the prophets in ancient Judea, the dancers sing, play their instruments, and bring change wherever they go. Our celebration invites more people into the dance, and our voice erodes the lies of Babylon and breaks its power.
If any of us is separated from the others, we seek them out to bring them back into the dance. When separated from the group, we continue the dance, speaking the Living Word to break Babylon so we can find our way home. The dance has always spiraled in the world. It cannot be stopped.
When the Kin-dom Appears Among Us
The Kin-dom is stretched out across the world, but many do not see it. Day by day, as we dance through the four paths, remembering the original blessing we were created in, we live in this Kin-dom.
Life becomes more abundant as we live together in mutual aid, care, and support. Life is not just food, clothing, and shelter, but the meaning and purpose we find through such an interconnected life. It is also the meaning and purpose we find in living a life that matters to us.
Together, we support one another, and not even Babylon can take that away from us. In our diversity, we all bring different talents, skills, resources, and tales to the circle, and together we grow stronger for it.
Babylon flees from those who are truly alive. Truth shields us from its lies. Our connections hold us together as it tries to work its isolation and alienation on us. Our collective strength cannot be overcome by Babylon, but it is our light. Darkness must flee from the light.
Despair flees as we help one another and dare the dark to find healing and peace. Since it cannot fester, it cannot infect us and drive us into the arms of Babylon. We are free to live in the joy of the world, and celebrate its wonders.
So long as our sanctuaries are strong and offer refuge to those within, Babylon cannot have any sway over us. The Kin-dom is here. It has always been here and will always be here.
All we have to do is join the dance.