Bad day...

Nobody cares. Really. For the most part, every issue we face, everything we do, all that we accumulate and amass over our lifetime, all that we give away and contribute to amounts to diddly squat. Nobody cares.

I got jacked up at the plasma center today.

















(This photo was taken several days later but it gives a good idea of why I had to wear long sleeve shirts in the middle of summer...)

Put a hole in my vein, bled out around the needle, now, ten hours later, my arm is beginning to look blue. They stuck my other arm...nothing. Two hours, one waiting, one being prodded like a corpse, and ten bucks is what I get, five dollars for each stick. Unbelievable. And I probably won't be able to donate this week 'cause my arm is jacked up. I realized today what it feels like to be a commodity. Wow. It's bad enough I sell my blood for oil but just what this means became clear today.

It started with some dipshit cutting in line in front of me. No apologies, nothing, just stepped right up. It happens all the time, people whose lives are such that this is their assertion of power. So I let him. But it rattled me. It started me off. And of course when I was getting stuck he was in the bed right in front of me so I could look right at him.

And the very fact that I am stating this, looking at it, realizing just what my situation is, it saddens me deeply. How did I get here? How is it that this is somehow ok?

But I exercised damn it. I iced my arm for several hours, put a hot towel on it to try and bleed it out and I worked my back and biceps today. Kiss my ass, jackin' me up like that. Sorry I'm not too expressive today, profanity a substitute for some anger convoluted through poetics. I'm pissed. And tired. And I feel like I'm disappearing, like I could just vanish.

It's not even that no one would notice. I would just be gone. I'm partially there. Maybe what I really desire is that it just happen that way so I can be done with it. I'm basically a sponge, a consumer, taking, taking, taking. What do I contribute? Obviously nothing as my circle of influence is pretty small. Aloof, bored, arrogant. This is how I appear. And maybe this is who I am.

Everything seems stupid, in a pointless, futile kind of way, not in a way that I know so much better. Because I don't. But I am failing today to see the point.

I have no joy at the moment. Even my love for music fails to move me. It all seems boring. Have I lost faith? Have I no love? Is this what it means to lose hope? And it isn't because of the plasma incident. No, it goes much deeper than that. It's been coming on for years and I feel completely helpless to stop it.

It feels as if I am dying, slowly, rotting from the inside out. It will be a long time before my body catches up to how I actually feel inside. It's horrible to say these thing because from appearances, I've got it good. Good health, healthy family, a job (well, two...plus blood for oil), a roof over my head, food in my belly, reliable transportation, a right mind and relative freedom (except that irritating suburban groupthink thing).

And yet...

My last thoughts before going under the knife...

I had some minor surgery yesterday, a couple of lumps removed from my back. I wasn't aware prior to yesterday that I'd actually be anesthetized, figuring it was minor surgery with just a little localized numbing.

I've always asked questions, watched them when they stick me with the needle, always wanting to know what's going on (or in). So I was quite aware and present when they put the sleeping solution in. I was quite aware of the feeling that I was going under, the heaviness, the loss of motor functions. It's quite a cool feeling. I kept repeating, "I'm about outta here, huh?"

Anyhow, my last thoughts/words were "Thank you, Jesus." It was a warm, peaceful feeling, quite comforting.

I really do hope that what we are taught to and come to believe is true in the end. I really do hope someday to meet him and see the truth, knowing even as we are now known.

Headz...the file sharing debate...

So it's the weekend, Saturday morning, and I'm at work...again. I've just listened to Flunk's For Sleepyheads Only, a gem of an album that is a great way to mellow out. There's enough variety in the music to capture the many moods and rail them toward a singularity of pensiveness.

Next on the playlist was the Headz compliation from Mo' Wax records from the mid-90s. This thing is long out of print on CD and command upwards of $100 to obtain. I happened across it online and have this volume as well as Headz 2A (currently listed at amazon for $158) and 2B (not listed at amazon). Both 2A and 2B are being listed on ebay at the moment, 4 LPs each for a total of 8 LPs. Bidding is at $30. If I were to pay this price for any of these, I couldn't bear to listen to them because they cost so damn much money.

So I downloaded all three comps. Respect to the musicians and the record label. Reality check. The record label and musicians will never see another penny out of out of print merchandise. The only ones profiting on these now are the owners and ebay. The sad truth is I do not feel any remorse for downloading these.

In fact, had I not downloaded these I may never have discovered some of the artists on the package and sought out their other work, some of which I've actually paid money to obtain though obtaining them used, the artist/label won't see a dime of my money.

But I enjoy the music. It's some of the finest I've heard in a long time, especially in today's musically sanitized bubble filled with corporately cloned imitation of music. It's a throwback to the time when the beat actually meant something. So I rave about the compilations and, more significantly, the musicians.

So in terms of file sharing. It's no different than swapping vinyl as a teenager in the 80s or sharing cassettes or copying an LP onto cassette for a friend. It's just that as technology has changed and become more efficient, the methods of copying and sharing has also gotten more efficient. The Internet has merely taken what has been a rite of passage and put it on an infinitely greater scale. Now the little that the record companies lost by friends trading tapes has increased to a worldwide market of individuals on an anonymous scale.

Everything in this day and age is exaggerated. File sharing is no different. And I avoid Morpheus, Limewire and the rest like the plague. It's easy pickin' for lawsuit hungry record company lawyers. There are other means of downloading that avoid this route altogether.

So I agree, support your favorite artists. If at all possible, go see their show (though, again $50 and up for a ticket is about a day or more's wage for most fans). Buy their merchandise, hopefull from their own site, if available, where they may reap the most benefit. The day is coming when the means of distribution will no longer be in the hands of the few but will, for the savvy musician, be in the musician's own hand to distribute as seen fit.

My personal favorite idea is this: if you download some music, send the musician/band a check directly.

Why am I not a Muslim?

Here is how I perceive the difference between the two faiths.

Islam is natural. It is easy, recognizable, something of a "yeah", what the Qur'an calls a Reminder. It is like a homecoming, something you intuitively know but it is spelled out for you. That is why it is called "reversion" instead of "conversion." The signs of God are all around. Look at nature, the pattern of night and day, the growth of plants and all the natural phenomena. The Qur'an states that everything has been created in pairs, either in the sense of mates, male and female, or in the sense of the sphere of duality within which man operates (e.g. dark/light, good/bad, right/wrong, etc.). While there are some proscriptions in the Qur'an that are difficult to accept, the overall theological picture is quite simple.

Christianity is not natural. At least not on the surface. It isn't a homecoming. It is a complete rupture of what we think of when we think of God. Trinity. Incarnation. Death of God. The God-man. All these concepts Christians trumpet proudly are actually disruptive both in the sense of causing a complete change in our worldview and also in the sense that they are a distraction from the true essence of the message of Jesus. The theology is not easy. It is not a "reversion." It is almost unnatural, thus the reason so many Christians seem to look down on nature, both human and in the world at large. No, Christianity is a constant struggle.

So why not Islam? Obviously, it sounds appealing. There are three reasons.

1) Muhammad. I have no idea who he was. With all that is written about him, you can basically pick and choose and create your own Muhammad. Simple man, fixed his own clothes, allowed his wives to talk back to him, gentle with children, submissive to God. Or he was a war monger who was interested in power and used religion to obtain it. And just about everything in between. There is more written about Muhammad in the traditions attributed to him than there are about Jesus. And it is impossible to really know who he was. The "living Qur'an"? Well, if I can't understand him, how can I understand the Qur'an? I can't as I will interpret it according to my experience.

2) Aisha. Tradition asserts that she was six when betrothed to Muhammad, nine when their marriage was consummated. He was in his fifties. I don't care about the culture of the time. That is deeply disturbing. Even if we question the sources and bump her age up into her teens, it's still peculiar. Either those who told the tale that she was six or nine were projecting their own culture onto Muhammad or it happened as it has been related. And the fact that there are questions surrounding it verify my issue #1.

3) Beating your wife. Surah 4:34. Not much to say there. Unless that is reinterpreted and shown to be wrong and accepted by the majority of scholars to mean something akin to "separation" then the verse in the Qur'an is horrible. Period. No matter how we reason it out. Even acknowledging that it was perhaps a limiting verse on previous practice, it is still bothersome that it is in there, spelled out that clearly. Truly it gives permission to the husband. And, human nature what it is, will not be seen as a limitation but as a command.

Those are the three primary reasons I am not a Muslim.

Why am I a Christian?

1) Jesus. Plain and simple. I have never encountered a figure of his stature. And this isn't buying into the God-man thing. That doesn't interest me a whole lot. I have found that wherever it is that we go in our spiritual journey, from the highs to the lows, Jesus is there. He is us. He is our mirror. When we look at him, he reflects back to us who we really are and we thus ascend toward being like him.

For every injustice, trauma or damage we suffer, he was crucified. Perfect love. Sinless. Human with a capital "H". He taught us how to love. He has shown us the love of God. He has shown us God. In his person.

Even if we argue that the New Testament is corrupt and all the other attacks of critics, there is still a very clear and precise picture of who Jesus is. We may differ on some points but overall, this picture is clear. And this picture is of a man that you wish to follow. By following in his footsteps, by doing what he says, you begin to see what it means to really follow God, to really love and to really love.

It is paradoxical and it turns your world upside down. And in doing so you become more and more like Jesus; you become more and more human. And in doing so, God becomes a very real presence in your life.

Surah 4:157 (Part II)

So how to reconcile Christian belief with that of Islam? It can't be done, though the tales in Islamic tradition of Jesus being raised are actually the closest we can come. But these traditions are non-sensical and require more faith to believe than those of the Christian claims.

No, what the Qur'an says is that the Jewish boasts are false. The crucifixion never happened. Crucifixions happened (and the Qur'an claims this happened during Egyptian's heyday which is another story altogether) according to the Qur'an. But not to Jesus. The Jews falsely believed this and their bragging of it is false.

If in fact the Qur'an is speaking about Christians in this verse, it could only be if Christians were calling the Jews of the region "Christ-killers" (something easily found in the Christian historical record) and the Qur'an is refuting this claim.

But the verse is not a historical account of what happened. It is apparent that Jesus was persecuted, as Muhammad was persecuted, as all Prophets have been persecuted, but there is no interest in validating Christian claims that Jesus was crucified. The Qur'an does not answer what happened to him. It does not answer what happened to any of the Prophets prior to Muhammad. He thus died (cf. Surah 3:55). The 'raising' in question (rafa'nahu, phrases also used in 19:57, 4:158 and 4:172) is exaltation of status which Muhammad Asad renders as "whom We exalted."

So what happened to Jesus? The Qur'an does not say. The question remains unanswered. All answers to the question come from outside the Qur'an and/or are interpretations of what the Qur'an says. But the Qur'an itself is essentially silent on the matter.

The Qur'an does not speak of a Docetic/Gnostic Jesus. It does not speak of another person dying on the cross for Jesus. It does not speak of Jesus being raised alive to heaven. No. The crucifixion did not happen. Period. Jesus, as all Prophets before him, spoke his message, was persecuted for it, and kept a gathering of disciples (i.e. muslims) true to his word who carried the message forth.

This is perfectly consistent with the Qur'anic ideal. Any paths to dialogue begin here.

This idea troubles Christians greatly. How can there be such little interest in the Jesus of the Christian faith? One verse lays aside the crux of the Christian faith? One verse? That's it? It's maddening to the Christian. So Christians read back into the verse the aberrant theologies floating around in regions of Persia/Arabia as an explanation of the verse, Muslims retort, developing elaborate stories influenced by and in response to these Chrisitans claims and the convoluted Islamic Jesus develops.

On the flip side, Muhammad begins to take on the characteristics attributed to Jesus. This shows not only the influence of Christianity on the traditions that would develop about Muhammad but also show the phenomenology of how a tradition about someone developes.

It can be argued, and often is, that a similar process occurred in the deification of Jesus though Christianity did not have the safeguards preventing this from occurring and thus the development of the Trinity in order to maintain monotheism. But that is another story.

Surah 4:157 (Part I)

So how do I reconcile the cross with this Surah from the Qur'an? In reality, it's not possible. The Qur'an categorically denies that Jesus died on the cross; thus there is no resurrection.

However, the curious thing about this is that resurrection, prior to Christianity, at the latest, and perhaps during the time in which Daniel was written (accepting the belief that at least part of Daniel was written during the Hasmonean period) at the earliest, there was no belief in the resurrection in Judaism. Perhaps it existed in other religious traditions in some form or other but that did not become manifest, and this differently, until around the time of, and explicitly after, Jesus.

So if in fact this was the message of all those who came before Muhammad, it makes me wonder how it is that the resurrection has always been taught yet is completely absent from the earliest layers of Judaism. And does this mean the Qur'an validates other religious traditions that had a similr belief, such as that of Zoroastrianism and even Buddhism with its belief in reincarnation (arguably, on this premise, a distorted version of the idea of resurrection)?

Anyhow, back to the question at hand. Christian polemicists see in verse 157 a historical account of the events at the cross. It is implying that, no matter how skewed from the main body of Christian belief (i.e. a 'Docetic' gnosticism), the Qur'an actually validates Christian belief, on some level.

This isn't to deny the influence of a 'gnostic' type of Christianity on the Qur'an's view of Jesus (there can be no doubting that whatever Christianity was present in the Hijaz region, Jesus giving life to the birds is found in the Qur'an and in the gnostic writings). But verse 157 is not giving a historical account of what happened.

And Muslim commentators have fallen prey to the same thing, thus their elaborate explanations as to what happened to Jesus. There are many views of what happened to him, the most commonly promoted one being that Judas was placed on the cross in his stead which thus makes Judas a type of hero, a martyr, willingly laying down his life for Jesus.

But this is false also. The influence of Christianity really shows in the commentaries. It is through the commentaries that the idea of Judas being substituted enters in. It is not inherent in the Qur'anic text itself. It is read into the verse and is almost impossible to extract a different meaning once this view is held.

But look at the context of the passage. Beginning in verse 153, it is the Jews about whom the Qur'an speaks. It is not addressed to the Jews (as the Qur'an is for the hearers of Muhammad) but is speaking about the Jews. This continues to verse 162. Verse 157 falls right in the middle of this. It is speaking of wrong views and actions of the Jews; it does not speak of Christian belief. In other words, it simply says they (i.e. the Jews) did not kill Jesus though they brag that they did so, killing him as they had killed other Messengers before. This is the claim the Qur'an refutes.

What "appeared to them" was the event that Jesus was crucified. The Qur'an is silent on what actually happened. When verse 158 says God raised Jesus to himself, this is not a physical raising. That idea is more absurd than the Christian claim as Jesus would physically be alive somewhere in space. This is not the new "glorified" body of which Christians speak but a flesh and bones, earthly Jesus physically residing somewhere in the universe.

And even if, as some claim, the raising was of his soul, that would mean his body died which begins to sound like the Christian claim that his body died on the cross and he was raised alive. It radiates the influence of Christian theology and thus the Muslim scholars' attempted response to these claims.

Surah 19:57 uses the same phrase in regards to Idris (believed to be Elijah). So if Jesus was raised bodily (or even soulically) to heaven, so too was Idris. This, of cousre, is not believed. So why is it believed this is what happened to Jesus? Christian influence.

And of course this opens the door to all the other traditions that are derived from this idea, from the second coming of Jesus (coincidence?), the Dajjal, Gog and Magog, and Jesus dying after a certain period of time when re comes again. That would mean he is 2,000 years old.

What happened on the cross?

I hear it said frequently that God died on the cross. Then I hear the next statement that God in Christ died on the cross. Or that Jesus' human nature died on the cross but his divine nature didn't. There are a million different variations on this theme.

But it hit me in church today that what happened on the cross was the door shut when Jesus died. That open door to heaven, that immediate access to God through Jesus closed when his heart stop beating. That was the darkness spoken of in the Gospel accounts. God was still in the world as there is nowhere He is not but what happened there on Calvary is that intimacy, that intensity, of God present in full through the fleshly being of Jesus was gone.

God was intimately present in Genesis. Over time, as the Biblical writings attest, God is more and more distant from His people. Yet the Second Temple period is not silent; the "400 years of silence" of which Christian tradition speaks is a myth. No, the literature of this period of time is immense. The Nag Hammadi caves attest to this. So they were looking, seeking, asking, writing amidst the continuous confusion their lands being swarmed with invaders, from the Babylonians to the Greeks to the Romans, a whirlwind in which the Jewish homeland was caught.

So he was sought in a Book, in the Word, both in the Hebrew writings and the Greek philosophy that had made such inroads. And here comes the Christian claim that God Himself was found not in a book, not in philosophy, but in a person. God, in fullness, dwelling in and through Christ. It was if you could look into Jesus and, seeing through him, see God.

This was what was closed when he died on the cross. The stories of him lived, books about him were written and the Holy Spirit is ever present within the hearts of believers making Jesus very real and very present in their lives. But these are growing pains, both of the individual who accepts this call, and that of the world as a whole made up of the individuals who accept the challenge to follow him and make him real in the world.

But on the cross that door was closed. To those who witnessed it they sensed that communion with God has been broken, that there was a rift in the universe.

And then there is the resurrection. Jesus, no longer entangled in the likeness of men, is free from the fetters of death. He is the resurrection; he is the new life; he is the firstborn from the dead; he is the Alpha and the Omega point of this new creation, restoring the original creation that men had lost.

He has opened us a new door into the heavenlies, having entered the Holy of Holies, his life, his sacrifice, his blood, the completion and perfection of all that the Law desired to do in men. There was nothing left for men to do; he had accomplished all that men could ever hope to achieve, all that men longed for in the deepest parts of their bowels. He is now priest, king, lord, all of those titles given to lesser men as "types" of what Jesus was to become.

So God did not die on the cross. Jesus died on the cross.

Ever have the feeling...

...that your purpose is eluding you?

I've studied comparative religions for many years. Even have a degree to prove it. It seemed, at the time, that was my calling, to go off to grad school, to get a degree, and become a professor. But I wasn't some young pup with no commitments. At the time (as now) I had a family, a house and bills, bills, bills. Not exactly easy to pick up and head off to grad school. Didn't happen. Not happening now.

And yet the studies continue.

So what is my purpose? As my wife's father, a wise country minister from Jamaica says, I'm backed up. If I don't let it out, I get backed up, to put it politely. Yet in my approach to teaching/discussing these things, I often hear the term "on the fence" used in a derogatory sense. Have I not committed to anything? Or is my lack of commitment my only commitment? I've heard this used as well, especially with the "lukewarm" tag applied to it.

Am I delusional to think that I have some "higher" calling? Or is my fate to sit here on a Saturday morning, listening to Boozoo Bajou, drinking my 60 cent Frappio beverage with its 288 milligrams of caffeine, writing a blog that might be read by someone out in the anonymous compuniverse? Is this what I am reduced to? Is this enough? What is it that I want?

Well, I am in between. I am a Christian, certainly, because of Jesus, not because of the Church's theology to which I cling loosely, the proverbial finger pointing at the moon, to use a Zen/Daoist metaphor. And yet I am fascinated by Islam. So I am this Chrislamist with Daoist leanings. I am a mutt. I can distinguish between the various layers of this belief but from the outside I must appear confused. Or insane. Sigh...

My truth?

Music. It is the embodiment of the human experience, encapsulating the movement of history and the voices that carry it.

Jesus. The perfect human being, both repository and mirror of the perfection of our humanity, us and yet not us.

Daoism. No finer philosophy to explain the human conundrum.

Islam. In the sense of submission to One God.

Love.

"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:13)

Of course we can argue that philo, the Greek word for 'friends', is better rendered as 'brother' and is thus used in the context of fellow believers which thus makes this command very particular. However, if we stretch the definition of 'brother' to be that of the human race, it validates the point. Love is to be completely selfless and, more accurately, to be actively desiring nothing but completeness, telios, for all fellow human beings.

"Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.
Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love [is] the fulfilling of the law." (Romans 13:8, 10)

"For all the law is fulfilled in one word, [even] in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." (Galatians 5:14)

"If ye fulfil the royal law according to the scripture, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, ye do well..." (James 2:8)

Interstitial

Jesus. Yes, that Jesus. God? Man? Both? What? Of all the subjects I can think of, none stirs up such passions as that one. Fists were thrown over it back when it was being formulated in the fourth century. Men were excommunicated and exiled over it. I'm sure men were killed because of it.

I have come to the conclusion that the only position we can really hold is this dramatic tension. Jesus is in such a position, based on the writings we have about him, that he sits in between. Mediator, yes. But the nature of the writings are such that we can't exactly pinpoint who he is. Just when we think we have him figured out, he shifts on us and appears to be something else. No matter where we are in our life, in our thoughts, in our hearts, we find that he is present. No matter how low or how high, he is there. So we can't nail him down, no pun intended. He is elusive, shifty, yet in the same breath very Real.

One Scripture seems to indicate he is God yet in the same breath another one says he is a man. The phrase thrown out by apologists that if he is "just" a man is bait for a preplanned retort. I don't know of anyone who think he is "just" a man, as if he were somehow ordinary, average, no different than of us as this would do little to explain how it is that his name has been passed on for 2,000 years. Even those who refuse calling him God do not believe his humanity somehow lessens his status.

So the Church formulates a God-man. While it can stimulate the intellect and lead to mental gymnastics bar none, in the end he sounds like Aquaman or Superman, Batman or Spiderman, quite comic bookish. The term gets thrown around as if we should hold our head up high over it.

The New Testament revelation, the Gospel, is that Jesus is the God-man?

I don't think so. I'm pretty sure that's not what is preached in the New Testament. I'm pretty sure this is not what the earliest Church Fathers preached. I'm pretty sure that the first Christians were not made because of this idea.

It can obviously be argued that this is a conclusion to be drawn but it is not the essence, the essential, of the faith. If it was there would be no new Christians until they believed this to be true. No, people are not asked this prior to accepting Christ. People are asked to recognize that they are sinful, separated, cut off from God and that through Christ's death, burial and resurrection, this connection can be reestablished as it was in the beginning, thus being born again, i.e. "from above."

Everything else stems from here.

I don't get it...

Could be because I just watched Jesus Camp and was a bit freaked out by it or it could be because I worked all night but I was at church this morning and everyone was really excited and the presence of God was thick in the atmosphere and I realized I don't get it. What was the fuss about? What is it that we get all worked up about?

When altar call came I went along because I didn't feel like being the only one sitting there. Poor motivation? Sure. Hasn't everyone done this? Why do we go to the altar week after week? The whole "if you..." question always posited before altar call backs you into a corner, as if by not going to the altar you are somehow not the answer in the "if" question.

Something was missing today. Maybe it was sleep.

Jesus Camp

I really wanted to hate this movie, to be so fired up by the lunacy of the fundies that I would have something scathing to say against them. That didn't happen. On one level, I know these people and the beliefs they cherish. On some level, the variety of Christian circles I run in harbors many who share similar views, their children home schooled, fans of Dubya, supporters of the war under the guise of freedom, the rallying cry to pray for the President on "the issues" facing our country. I can respect that and can respectfully disagree.

The pledge of allegiance in church? A pledge to a Christian flag? Creepy. The emergence of an army of Christian soliders seeking nothing short of a theocracy really is frightening.

Anyhow, they are certainly not shown in an unfavorable light and were obviously given full access to the lives of these individuals. This is what they believe and they believe their children need to be taught in the right way. We may disagree with them forcing creationism upon them but it is their right. We may view these children as being brainwashed. I mean, at eleven years old, how horrible is your life that you cry tears of such anguish and pain for your sins? Where did they learn this? Are they really convicted or is it fear mongering? No easy answers there.

But I came away truly feeling for these individuals and their beliefs, especially the founder of the Jesus Camp. She is a sweet woman who is passionate about what she believes, though it is clear she has her own issues. I sense in her a passion for her calling but couldn't help but feel that there is also a loneliness in her unaddressed. Or perhaps it was just the camera angles.

The thing that sinks, or confirms, the film is Ted Haggard. There is an irony in his inclusion here, I suppose, in his mocking tone while preaching about the same subject matter in which he found himself scandalized. It's hard not to look at him and think about that.

Overall it is a sympathetic portrayal. Not all Christians are like this and not all fundamentalists are like this. They may share some, or even most, of these beliefs, but this is only a small subset of a very dynamic culture so it is certain stereotypes will abound. But it is a thought provoking film, disturbing on some levels, quite moving on other levels.

But I know these people. I am in their midst and yet I am not one of them. I am not sold out, not so much on Jesus, as much as I am quite aware of what can only be described as a culture that operates under the banner of his name and seek to limit my association with it. I am, in fact, one of the ones that one of the young evangelists mocks and claims is "dead". Sigh...

Taste and see...

I'm trying to get my arms around these posts. There seems to be little coherence other than the fact they all revolve around me. Is this self-absorption, thinking that maybe these will be of interest, of relevance, to someone, maybe even me? I feel as if I am on the outside looking in, a casual observer of a life other than my own.

I enjoy tasting and seeing. What goals do I have other than to experience? Is it the rush, the buzz, the fix? Or am I really learning anything? If so, what? And what do I do with it? What good is all this experience if it remains locked up inside, feeding on itself like a cancer?

The Beach Body you've always wanted...

About eight weeks ago I gave in to my wife's addiction for infomercial exercise products (in her defense, she's a personal trainer) and we picked up a copy of P90X from BeachBody. I'm not one to promote products that don't work and I generally don't believe the hype of most exercise/diet related products.

Common sense should dictate what to do: eat right and move.

The thing that caught my attention was that the basis of this program was the pull up, the majority of the exercises rooted in the body's weight. I had no idea what to expect; it just looked intense (and pull ups look really cool).

So here it is:
- one hour a day three days a week doing strength training - chest, back, shoulders, arms and legs - with with an extra fifteen minutes afterwards doing a killer ab routine
- plyometrics (jump training) one day a week
- yoga one day a week and
- kenpo (a cardio kickboxing kind of thing) one day a week.

Three weeks of one set of strength training exercises, followed by a "rest" week of yoga, plyo and kenpo only, followed by three weeks of a different set of strength training exercises (a concept called "muscle confusion"), another "rest" week and four weeks, rotating the two varieties of strength training each week, followed by a final "rest" week for a total of 13 weeks or 90 days (thus P90X).

We are as of today just finishing week nine. I am in the best shape of my life. I have a history of weight training. Throughout most of my twenties I maintained a fairly vigorous weightlifting routine and was in good shape. But nothing like this. I can honestly say I've never felt so good. I can touch my toes for the first time in my life with ease, I can touch my heels to the ground during downward dog and the chronic pain I've had in my scapula for as long as I can remember has vanished.

A certain level of fitness is required to even consider beginning this routine. It's not for the weak or faint of heart. Without familiarity with intense physical exercise and the mental discipline required to remain intensely physical, it would be quite easy to give this up. An hour a day of intense physical exercise is both physically and mentally challenging.

My mental state has improved, my buried anger has surfaced and is being dealt with, partially through the release of the toxins anger harbors and I am physically fit. I don't care about so much about having a "beach body" (the title of the post is tongue in cheek) but the feeling, the knowing, that my health is in a good state of being is quite a rush. Rather than be absorbed in the body and its pitiful state or the glorification of it, my mind is freed up to focus on other things (though remaining focus is something I haven't mastered yet, distraction and self-abuse my general mode of being).

This is truly one thing I look forward to each day, especially the yoga, definitely a meditative experience. Turn down the lights, block out the noise and go deep, the meshing of the body and mind a near religious experience.

I am currently up to nine pull ups. I'm about to hit ten. Not too shabby considering several weeks ago I was lucky to get two.

Get it.

Bring it.

Be a plasma donor...

I confess. I donate plasma. Twice a week. I've been doing it for about a year and a half now. And I enjoy it. It's a chance to be still for an hour or so, put on some headphones, listen to tunes and read a good book, all for the $20 to $40 per visit. I clock my time in and out and generally average at least $15 per hour. I make more money hourly than I do at my regular job. And I'm certain they make a boatload of money off of my plasma. My wife and I jokingly say that I am going to "bend over and grab my ankles" (after all, this truly is blood for oil).

It's quite relaxing, the phelobotomists are all sweet and the atmosphere and conversations are truly stimulating. You've got regulars, often the same days and times as you, depending on how regular you are. Considering that I lived downtown for a few years and worked as an outreach worker with the homeless for a few years, I feel quite comfortable in this environment. On some level it was karmic, I willed it to be.

When I lived downtown, I lived in a loft apartment in the warehouse right next door to the donation center. The warehouse has since burned down. It was my favorite apartment I've lived in, free to roam, climb on the roof on those clear, bright nights with the full moon, roll up a J and chill. But I digress...

So I knew of it but knew nothing about it. When I began working with the homeless I became familiar with it. It held a fascination. Eventually, I was drawn in.

You don't see many professionals coming down (and it's always "down" isn't it?) to donate. I doubt many suburbanites even know what it is. College students and those on the lower rungs, for whatever reason, of the socioeconomic ladder make up the mainstays. It tends to be a rough crowd, though there is a high degree of respect, especially for those who come regularly, for those who work there.

The first time, however, is quite intimidating, most likely, in my case, due to the biases I held toward doing such a thing. I can't say it violated any religious principle (I am not a Jehovah's Witness, obviously) I held though I did question that. Am I selling my soul along with my plasma? I think it violated some other caste type structure I held in my brain, that I was somehow above it or that doing that was stooping beneath what I am capable of doing.

But there is this part of me that is curious (and needed the money) and one Saturday morning I decided to go for it. I've been doing it ever since.

Why do I write this today? Because I was almost PR'd, i.e. placed on permanent restriction. Forever. Each time you come in to donate you are asked a series of health related questions (which the employees rattle off from rote memorization and the donors respond in like fashion, 12 No's and 1 Yes) and a series of basic health measurements are taken, including blood pressure, pulse rate, temperature and, more importantly, the protein content and liquidity of the plasma.

My plasma is frequently on the low end of the spectrum as I don't eat red meat and chicken and fish are not cheap sources of good protein. Every four months, a draw is taken and sent out to a lab for testing. It must meet minimum levels in order for the donor to continue. If it fails to do so, you can no longer donate until a redraw is done and is approved by the testing lab. I failed once in the past, two times in a row. Fortunately, I passed, barely, on the third redraw. Had I failed a third time, I faced PR.

This time around I wasn't so fortunate. I failed three times. This, of course, got me questioning, and researching, and looking online and high and low for answers. My overall protein level was ok. It was my gamma level that was low. What is gamma? I had no clue. The only clues I was given were on a sheet at the donation site that mentioned drugs, alcohol or infection. The nurse who informed me of this put out the comment "you know what it is" to which I replied: "I have no idea. I haven't done drugs or had a drink of alcohol in over ten years." I was no longer one of "them" and she changed her demeanor and took me a bit more seriously.

I still don't have an answer but by going online and doing search engines I found low gamma levels in various rare, untreatable or terminal diseases such as renal failure, leukemia, and immunodeficincies of various kinds. So of course I got a bit nervous. It's always been low and my gamma globulin level has always been right on the border.

Years ago I would have been banned outright. But a new procedure had been instituted where I had the option of going to see a doctor and getting tested and having his signature on some photocopied form providing my records, his awareness of my donating and the cause of the low protein. So I went to the doctor.

Keep in mind, it has now been several months. My gas money is now coming right out of my paycheck and my bills are suffering. Actually, our food consumption is suffering. Which, of course, affects my protein content in a continuing spiral downward. It was an experience in honesty informing my doctor that I donate plasma for gas money. I got a rather bizarre sense of satisfaction out of saying it.

The tests came back normal and my protein was good. I have no health history to speak of so there was no clear reason for the low protein/low gamma. So back to the donation site I trapsed and had a very nice chat, for the second time, with one of the nurses. I asked her how many people have been PR'd for this reason and she answered "none." That's not the kind of unique I wished to be at that moment.

In the meantime, I had begun to exercise, a pull up bar in the basement my motivation (see my P90X post here) . Add more protein to the diet, including protein powder, a little exercise and on the fourth redraw I passed. The elation was nothing short of ecstasy.

To a large extent, donating has been a little hideaway from the world, my time, a place where everybody knows your name.

My car...

I have two tires that consistenly go flat. Both are full of fix-a-flat. It's held now for about three days with no additional air. Both have been patched once, and then repatched because the patch didn't hold. It's a 1991 Toyota Tercel. 13" tires. I thought these would be cheap to replace. They aren't. With big tires all the rage nowadays, 13" tires are harder to find and have to be special ordered. Fifty bucks a tire. Crap. Fix-a-flat and patches. Such is life.

It's currently at 210,000 miles. I bought it about a year ago for $900. So far I haven't put any money into repairs though it needs brakework, a new exhaust, I put a quart of oil or two into once every month or so, and something is fishy with the suspension/steering. No air, AM/FM radio only, no cruise, it's pretty functional.

At least it runs. I've never been one to really care about cars. My last car was a 1990 Honda Accord that I ran into the ground (the leaky gas tank and dead alternator was the last straw). It had well over 200,000 miles on it (the Honda Accord before that had 225,000 miles when I gave it to my brother-in-law). I remember asking a Chevy sales rep before buying my first Honda Accord in the late 90s if he could guarantee me that a Cavalier would go over 100,000 miles and he looked at me as if I asked him to explain quantum physics.

It lasted almost ten years but I probably averaged a car payment in repairs every month in repairs. No driver's side mirror for seven years, having lost that when I fell asleep at the wheel on the way to my wedding and bumped off the back wheel of a semi-truck. Literally. Left the treadmarks on my car for those seven years as proof. Passenger's side mirror was cracked.

The rear bumper was Maaco'd. Having been rear ended, the other person's insurance company would pay to replace the bumper but said the rust where the bumper was attached was a pre-existing condition and they wouldn't pay for that. If I hadn't been hit, my bumper wouldn't need attached. It didn't matter and I wasn't about to get a lawyer to fight them. So I took their $1,000, got Maaco to attach it for $500 and I walked away with $500 in cash. The bumper held. It's nice to not care sometimes.

When it rained, the car leaked. Literally. The roof and all the seals around the windows had been siliconed so that wasn't it. But a puddle would form behind the driver's seat. I ended up drilling a hole in the floor (and no, I didn't drill a hole in the gas line) to drain it. The interior driver's side door handle didn't work, the key would sometimes get stuck in the ignition, the right touch required to remove it. Toward the end I just left it in the ignition, never worrying, always hoping, my car would be stolen.

I scrapped it for $90 with my high school weightlifting equipment that had been rusting in my basement.

Was given a 1994 Dodge Spirit as a gift. Same damn thing. Ball joints. Bad struts. Bad fuel lines. I put a boatload of into it as well. Scrapped it for $150.

At least our 2004 Saturn VUE has held up for three years, with no money put into it, although this counting the miles on a lease is a real headache. The warranty has certainly come in handy. Needs brakes, though. And the CD players hasn't worked in months and is not covered under warranty. We were told it didn't play mp3 CDs but this isn't true as it now plays nothing. It's cut back on the lease miles though as I have no reason to drive it other than the occasional privilege of having air conditioning.

Hate cars. Need 'em. Hate 'em.

Why does TBN scare me?

I was fumbling through some YouTube videos of converts to Islam from Christianity and from Islam to Christianity. It seems to be this really big competition, as if it were a sport of some kind, with rules and schemes and game plans and tactics and scores being kept. Kinda odd. Fascinating, but odd.

So I found a feature heading about 16,000 Muslims converting to Christianity and I start watching and notice it is from TBN. The channel creeps me out for some reason. From its horribly tacky decor, to its overdressed visitors, to the obligatory big hair of the wives and the slicked back grey hair of the hosts, to the overenthusiastic, cliche ridden blather that passes as dialogue, the audience appearing as if they are staged actors from late night infomercials, the whole thing is truly creepy.

I spent several years in a church where people watched TBN and praised it. I understand its appeal. I know what draws viewers to it. But something is fundamentally wrong with it. And I can never quite pinpoint it. But I know when I watch it. It is its own universe with its own language and its own dress code. I think that's what it is. It seems otherworldly. And I'm not talking in the sense of a replica of heaven. I hope heaven isn't this tacky. Blah.

Sure they are sincere, sure they are enthused and they may be speaking words of truth. But is this what is what someone would have to do in order to convert to the Christianity of which they speak? How do we separate the truth of the Christian message when it is so grossly packaged? Of course, that is my opinion. I may obviously be considered gross to someone else. Which reinforces the point.

How is the Truth separated from the package in which it is delivered?

In terms of the videos of Christians converting to Islam, these can be just as freaky. I can't help but notice that all of the converts begin to take on the same look, a beard that just won't come in, a certain glazed look in the eye as the talk into the camera. I recently found one where they had something of an altar call as people came up to accept Islam. They appeared before an entire congregation of Muslims, all shouting "Allahu Akbar" as the new recruits stepped forward to accept Islam. It was truly bizarre, nothing like my experience in a mosque when I had considered taking Shahadah. It's supposed to be a deeply personal, private thing, not a public event. Could it be that even Islam, so subdued and intensely personal, is falling prey to the cult of entertainment?

There is some weird stuff out there in conversion country. If either one of these represent what is in store for the convert, no wonder there is a militant atheist movement afoot.

Muttness

I did a Google on the term "spiritual mutt" and found very few hits. However, one of the pages was selling t-shirts with the term "spiritual mutt" on it. They trumpeted that a spiritual mutt is one who believes all religions are equally valid as the way to Truth. I balk at that notion.

A "spiritual mutt" is a matter of pedigree. It is one's DNA, if you will, not in one's current outlook or belief system. It is what it is; it is not what we wish it to be. Perhaps the t-shirt above should be read "spiritual wayfarer" or "spiritual voyeur" or "spiritual fondue" but certainly not "spiritual mutt".

My outlook is not what makes me a mutt. My DNA, all that which has come before me to make me as I am today, is what makes me a mutt. In that regard, perhaps, most of us are spiritual mutts. But my "muttness" is not that I believe all religions are the same. That is a discredit to these religions and takes something away from them; there is an undertone of hubris in that statement. There may be a "perennial philosophy" that we can extract but this is not the same thing as saying they are all the same.

To truly understand what it is that a particular religion unfolds, one must commit to it. One must take that one path deep. Taking the surface aspects of whatever religion looks good is of no benefit. It is safe but not transformative. The self (i.e. the ego) is still the Judge of Truth which is the antithesis of all religions. The Truth is independent of us, no matter how much we partake in it.

Take, for example, the poet Rumi. Everyone loves Rumi. About half of the Islam section of Barnes & Noble contains various works by him. But he has been removed from his context. He would have considered himself a Muslim, honoring the Five Pillars, bound by the Shari'ah. Most people who enjoy Rumi would not go that far. So he has been extracted from his context, recontextualized in the light of some vague definition of love and sold to a gullible public. But to understand his notion of love it is vital to understand the context in which he lived and moved and breathed. His notion of love, while bearing similarity to that of, say, the Christian idea of love, would be quite different in essence and this is lost in the desublimation of his works.

This happens all the time. Quotes are taken out of context, tossed into a book of quotes from the various world religions seeking to show their similarities and his quotes are attributed to him as a "Muslim" thus giving the appearance that the religions are the same. It's a nice gesture and it is certainly an improvement of trashing one another's religious beliefs but it is misleading, at best, dangerous, at worst.

I would compare it to what happens to many people who move in to my hometown. People who consider moving here from out of the area are shown our glorious Mill Creek Park. It is one of the finest parks I've ever seen. Then they are taken to the historical parts of town with big mansions from the steel mill heyday, well kept and well preserved. A spin through downtown and the city looks pretty good.

Until they move here. And get to know the area. And learn about the crime, the poverty, the difficult employment picture, the political infighting and the corruption. Had they known what was at the core, a different choice may have been made. No matter how much they wish it to be something else, no matter how much they make the most of it, at its core it is not what they were shown. Had they never moved here in the first place and had only the knowledge of what they had seen, they would probably have a pretty good image of it. And they might compare it to other cities in a positive light. They might even say it reminds them of another city that they have toured.

Such is the nature of the statement that all religions are the same.

Though I share the above views on my hometown and all its ugly (and all towns have ugly because all towns are made up of real people), I have actually found this to be advantageous. When the downtown are was delapidated and all but abandoned during the 90s, I had the complete freedom to roam at leisure through the abandoned buildings of downtown, walking leisurely through the abandoned lots of the former steel mills. It became my refuge, my sanctuary. I could pretty much go where I please unimpeded. The only people I would meet were the small community of homeless people utilizing these areas. Some of my fondest memories are from this period. I could go downtown and disappear and walk for hours on the train tracks without being bothered, take meditative shelter in buildings without hassle, or sit by the river for hours in some of the finest natural preserves in the area without trace of human habitation.

I have roughly 1,000 or so photos from this period. It wasn't until there was a resurgence of sorts in the downtown, the cheesification of it by tossing up a convention center (the architecture of which looks remarkably similar to the empty steel mill just across the bridge, pure function, its only character the lack or imitation of character) and looking to make an entertainment district. We do like to be entertained. It's another word of distracted. Distracted from dealing with reality as it is.

So even in the bleakness there was something positive to be found. But I sought it out, by accident originally, then willfully after a while. Rather than avoid it, I faced it. And was transformed because of it.

Perhaps religions are like that. All religions have a dark side. Perhaps in working through the dark side we find the traces of what was good before it and can learn from it. Perhaps in the darkness we can find light. And we can only work through this apparent darkness by facing it head on, alone.

Music

Sunday night at work. Work? Yes, work. I monitor test equipment. Once an hour I walk around and record pertinent data. I have to monitor changes and keep an eye on tests that may fail. Otherwise, alarms take care of that.

In the meantime, I have several hours to use productively (or not). I listen to music no matter what I am doing. It's an opportunity to really listen to music and experiment with new music. I have a good pair of over-the-ear headphones for those intricate pieces of music that require attentive listening (the alarm is really loud, in case you are wondering). I have been using this type of headphones since the early 80s. It's interesting to see they are making a comeback. A few years back, a guy asked me where I got them as he had been looking high and low for a pair. Hang on to something long enough it will come back (or you can sell it on ebay).

A pair of ear buds does the trick otherwise. It is rare when anything I listen to requires attentive listening, although tonight I listened to Alan Lamb's Night Passage, a recording of abandoned telephone wires whipping around in the wind in the Australian outback. Music? It sets a mood, that is for certain. It's quite addicting and I find myself drawn to it repeatedly. It draws me in, quiets my restlessness and keeps me grounded in the present.

Chemical Brothers We Are The Night (advance copy...check the date of my post to its actual release date) has just begun. So far, so funky, quite different than Exit Planet Dust and Dig Your Own Hole, two albums that really changed my view of what music can do, with the extra heavy emphasis on BASS. I have a Bose system at home that can handle the bass so it is great to hear the walls of my house vibrate and to actually feel the bass.

I have been through Hernan Cattaneo's Sequential 2, Boozoo Bajou's Satta! and Porcupine Tree's Fear of a Blank Planet. My most recent discovery has been the alt-country of Jim White and Johnny Dowd, both featured in the documentary Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus, a tall tale about the religiosity of the Deep South.

I was raised on a heavy dose of Motown, outlaw country of the Willie and Waylon variety (Ol' Waylon was my very first LP; I still have the vinyl), a little Gordon Lightfoot (Gord's Gold is still one of my favorite LPs), the desert sounds of the Eagles/America variety and some classical music on Sunday mornings.

The first album I remember, aside from Ol' Waylon, was AC/DC's Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap (told mom "Big Balls" was about ballroom dancing) and Van Halen's Diver Down. Somewhere in there is AC/DC's Back In Black and Kiss Alive II. The big hair "heavy metal" sounds were my childhood companion, dispelling my angst more by the volume of the music than what was being said. Motley Crue and Guns 'n' Roses were about as heavy as it got, though I got into Metallica when they had crossed over into the mainstream. Of course, there was the obligatory interest in classic rock, a la Led Zeppelin, a rite of passage if there ever was one.

Even then I went to concerts as diverse as Jimmy Buffett and The Monkees. Scattered in there was an interest in early rap, listening to it through an old clock radio in my bedroom late at night, Grandmaster Flash's "The Message" scaring the hell out of this suburban boy with talk of "junkies in the alley with baseball bat."

Somewhere in there, however, came my one true band that I followed, Pink Floyd. The Wall became my companion. When I was depressed, it cheered me up. It became my voice. I dissected that album inside out, going through a cassette and two copies on vinyl. It would be the first CD I bought. This was my life. Over time I worked through all of their albums from Dark Side of the Moon on, losing interest post-Roger Waters, though I did see them from the nosebleed seats of Cleveland Stadium in 1987. It was around this time that they no longer held relevance for me.

In college I went through a heavy Beatles stage. I also discovered the alternative music "scene" with the Violent Femmes, The Smiths and a host of other bands along those lines that were just hitting the radar screen. It was also my freshman year in college when Beastie Boys' first album hit. It was huge and was on constant rotation for an entire year.

I began gravitating toward "New Age" music (hate that name, sounds wimpy...come to think of it, most of it is). Though I had been exposed to Jean Michael Jarre in high school, it was a roommate who turned me on to Kitaro and the Windham Hill catalogue and they became mainstays. I was seeking sleeping, bliss out music. I was looking for escape. The alcohol wasn't working. I was looking for drugs.

This faded into deeper, moodier music the likes of early Melissa Etheridge, Toni Childs and Concrete Blonde (one of the most underrated bands ever), artists with meaningful lyrics that got at the roots of the rage I was feeling. I was getting deeper and deeper, abandoning the shallow and superficial music of my youth, looking for substance, looking for a place to land.

Over time bands such as Smashing Pumpkins, Morphine, Mazzy Star and early Nine Inch Nails crossed my path (with a dash of Grateful Dead sprinkled in). I was drawn to the moody atmosphere these bands created. There was some grunge and I ended up in Seattle for a year but about the only lasting effect of grunge was to make thrift stores and flannel shirts popular and pricier.

As the drug use became heavier I gravitated to trance inducing techno music, a phase that has lasted more than ten years, though I am gradually leaving this behind, finally. I think that music saved me from going off the anger cliff and at least provided some outlet, some sense of being able to leave it all behind.

But the drugs weren't working anymore and I found religion.

Nowadays I listen to most anything, as long as it is good. The music I listened to in my past is but a memory machine. When I hear it I am transported back but it has no relevance today. It's a snapshot of time.

Put all that together, shake it up and you have a musical mutt. I have almost 100 GBs of music (update: 10/09/15, over 2TB!), most of which I'll probably never get to. With nothing but an AM/FM radio in my car, very little opportunity at home to listen to music and the few hours on the weekend, most of this music is going to wait. Though I do drive with my ear buds in (looks like a cellphone headset anymore) it isn't the same.

Now that I'm thinking about it, perhaps interstitial is a better word, more functional. The view of what is happening is better from in between the cracks.

Let me clear my throat...

I suppose I should define what I mean by mutt, spiritual mutt in particular. By spiritual mutt I don't mean that I pick and choose smorgasbord style. There is nothing more disturbing to me than that style of spirituality. I remember seeing on the news the story of a woman who had an altar and she had various symbols from various different religions. She was a Christian, or something, who attended synagogue, and on her altar she had various symbols from various eastern religious traditions, a mish-mash of all kinds of things.

She chose all; in so doing, she really chose none. The thing that is scary about this is that her reference, her judge, of Truth is herself. There was no external frame of reference to guide her; ultimately, she was the one who determined what was true or not and she picked and chose what she believed to be the truth. In so doing, I do not see how she can really get into the depth of any one tradition. It is in the depths, it is in the choice, that we find the truly, deeply spiritual. If we are the frame of reference for truth, we go no deeper than self. And we are not talking the Self, the Atman, of which Hinduism speaks. We are talking the self against which the Self speaks. We are talking the ego.

To the best of my knowledge, all the mystics operated from within a chosen path. While their results display remarkable similarity, this only came after searching the depths of their respective tradition. By doing so, they recognized the depths of the same in other traditions. A mystic is not someone who sees the surface similarities and says all religions are the same and thus labels themselves a "mystic." In today's spiritual marketplace, the term "mystic" is the equivalent of saying "Oh, I'm spiritual, not religious." This is language that basically says either I do not wish to commit or I do not want to put in the time. I am my own truth.

A true mystic will be called that by someone else. A true mystic would see the label itself has no value.

My primary path is the Christian path. No matter where I go, no matter what I study, it all comes back to Jesus as my focus in terms of understanding God's character. I don't, however, close myself off to God's whispers - or shouts - wherever they may be found.

By mutt I am talking more about pedigree. I am talking about those influences, those life choices, those things that have contributed to where I am today, what has brought me here. All those things don't just vanish. They are there. A little agnosticism, a little skepticism, a little Daoism, a little Islam, a little mythology from the Joseph Campbell school of thought, a little bit of Oneness Pentecostalism and a whole lotta passion for knowledge. Put it altogether and you've a spiritual mutt.

My career path, my musical tastes, my taste in music, my relationships all follow this pattern. Woof.

Conference of the Books

Another Saturday night and I'm at work on the overnight shift. It's not as bad as it may seem (after all, look what I'm doing...).

I've been reading Conference of the Books: The Search for Beauty in Islam Khaled M. Abou Fadl. It is a remarkable book. One of the things that drew me to Islam originally was...

I suppose I should digress for a moment. Islam? What does that have to do with anything? Let me backtrack.

In 1996 I was baptized in a Pentecostal Church, the speaking in tongues thing, water baptism, Jesus' name, King James only, the works. How, you might ask? Me, Mr. Noncommittal, don't wish to join anything, don't believe anything, don't participate in anything? I'd say a woman but that isn't the whole picture. It was a woman (now my wife) who I was with that got me to attend church. I was drawn not so much to the beliefs but the commitment to the beliefs. So over the course of many months I found myself fascinated, drawn in originally by the choir and charismatic worship (a far cry from the staid tradition of my Presbyterian upbringing). I wanted to know just what it was that made them sing like that.

I was also drawn to the intellectual spirit of the pastor of the church. I had always figured you had to leave your intellect at the door of the church in order to be a Christian. He helped me to realize that this wasn't so. I got interested in the Bible, picked up a Strong's Concordance and began searching the scriptures.

Acts 2:38 is perhaps the pivotal text in any church that believes in baptism in Jesus' name. This church was no different. So, one Saturday evening, while my girlfriend at the time was not in the picture, I was with a friend and realized I had no Bible to my name. I asked to borrow hers. Upon entering my apartment that evening I flipped it open, as is my ritual, and pointed to Acts 2:38.

So the next morning, in church, by myself, with no support around, what was the text for the message? Acts 2:38. I decided right then and there to be baptized. That was it. No deeper thought than that. So at altar call I rushed forward (apparently before the message was actually over). After some questioning of, I suppose, my sincerity, I was led to the back where I changed into baptism clothes and was ushered into the baptismal pool. After the confession/profession of faith, I was dunked, full immersion, and came out of the water mumbling. Witnesses say I spoke in tongues. It sounded like babble to me. I was now a member (had I not spoke in tongues my membership probably would have been questionable).

So here I was. My girlfriend and her family (a long line of ministers) were thrilled. I was freaked out. What had I done? The trials really began. I began searching the scriptures more and more in depth and realized, over time, that I did not agree with what was being taught. So I began to question. And question. And question. The party was over.

Since no one I knew would have been willing or able to discuss my deep seeded questions, I found an online community at edepot.com. It seems to be primarily a Daoism page now, and a pretty decent one at that, but in 1996 it had a debate forum that was jumping. I still have the printouts from some of these discussions.

I came in with an attitude, like a know-it-all who had it all figured out and was trying to prop myself up as someone who would get deep. Didn't take long for me to realize I was shallow and knew little. Within a week or so I encountered a challenge I was unprepared for. Having harbored doubts about the doctrine I was being taught (Oneness Pentecostalism) I tried to show off my intellectual acumen in breaking down the truth. With one question I was brought to my knees and the doubts I harbored were exposed. One question.

Luke 10:25. The words of Jesus. Eternal life? Love God, love neighbor. Period. That was it plain and simple.

My doubts surfaced. The Oneness doctrine preached from the pulpit frequently referenced the shortcomings of the Trinity doctrine. I discovered that the Oneness doctrine was lacking. I now believed neither one. And I had no intention of becoming a Unitarian or any other label for that matter. All the denominations annoy the mess out of me, reminders of the schismatic nature of any organization.

It turned out that the individual who had been questioning me was a Christian who had converted to Islam. Islam? For as much as I had dabbled in other religions, I knew nothing about Islam. The more I spoke about how I viewed Christian doctrine, the more she said I sounded like a Muslim.

I reasoned and argued and debated and tried all kinds of sophistry but the reality of the matter was that my belief was not Trinitarian, not "Christian", but is really that there is One God (much of this has to do with my epiphany at Yosemite Falls about the oneness of being, Wahdat-ul-Wujud). Not three-in-one, not three manifestations of one essence, etc., all those things Christians argued about for hundreds of years (and still argue about).

The more she questioned and challenged, the more I realized I was in trouble. And so began my inquiry into Islam. Within a few months I would be performing salat in a mosque in Washington D.C., a transformative moment in not only my spiritual path but in my life as a whole.

Day 1

I can't believe I'm actually doing this. Blogging. I suppose it was inevitable. Got thoughts, lots of them, lots of thoughts that won't come up in normal conversation. What to do? Publish them for the anonymous masses to peruse, displaying what McLuhan hinted at when he said that our media are really our insides turned out.

I have come to realize that I am a mutt and proudly so. I tend not to be bound by convention. I'm no longer trying to be rebellious as a rebel is often slave to the very thing from which he rebels.

I am currently immersed in the midst of a spiritual/religious phase that has been ongoing most of my life, though more intensely so since circa 1996 as at that point I committed myself to (attempting to) be a Christian. But, as with most things, it wasn't too much longer after that that I found I had issues with the group think required to belong. So I'm on the outside of the inside looking in.

If I were to trace my interest in spirituality it would probably go back to hearing of God from childhood and living the majority of my life with fear, not reverence, associated with the word, as if "God" was out to get me, to punish me for being the mischievous person I was. In hindsight I realize that my self loathing and self absorption were manifestations of a narcissism that led me to believe that God was out to get me.

Self loathing and its manifestation as, in my case, depression were and are ultimately egoistic grasps at attention, sucking life out of the universe to satisfy in insatiable inner need, a bottomless vortex, akin to arrogance, both cries for help, both self-absorption to a distorted degree. I'm not sure when it started but at some point I found myself drawn to the eastern (from my western location) religions. This was probably more out of the appearance of being exotic, the hippy-dippy kind of thing I found myself gravitating toward.

In the late 80s I began stepping out of my comfort zone, aching for opportunities to break free from the suburban cultural Wonderbread in which I had been living. I was introduced to "New Age" music which, at the time, was a far cry from the big hair bands as the approved form of rebellion in suburbia. Such artists as Jean Michael Jarre, Kitaro and the Windham Hill catalogue became staples. In hindsight, these were as white bread as the big hair bands.

Eventually, circa 1991 or so, I would find the Dao De Jing, purchasing it because it seemed exotic, mysterious, enigmatic, cool. I would carry it with me, read it on the john, never really getting it. It was during this time that my drinking got heavier and I rendered myself an alcoholic, going cold turkey, substituting various chemicals in its stead. This would lead to a break with reality (i.e. leaving a $50,000 a year job to hit the road...literally). The little DDJ accompanied me in my travels.

Sitting in a rocking chair on a balcony at a youth hostel in Idaho one evening, the sun setting, in a moment, the entire book made sense. It was truly an epiphany. I can't remember which chapter I was reading but it was as if a flood gate opened. Quite literally, in that moment, I "got" it. The book suddenly made complete sense. I would be forever changed, my struggling in the confines of duality rendered asunder.