The light of truth. The light of Christ. He is the light of the sun and the power thereof. He is the light of the moon and the power thereof. He is the light of the stars and the power thereof. The earth also, and the power thereof. The light in all things, even the power of God which sitteth upon the throne.

-thus D&C 88:5-13.

Now, one might say truthfully that glory = power plus light. Righteous power = power plus light. But the scriptures say that you cannot even really separate the two concepts. Power without light is ultimately not actually power. Light without power is ultimately not actually light.

How did I miss this gem from SPDI?

On Pills, Blue and Red

Here is an analogy I don’t think I’ve ever seen made (though it must have been): the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil <=> the Matrix’s “Red Pill.”

Something is lost when you start chowing down on red pills. You gain knowledge, but you lose innocence.

Adapting yourself to the world is (by definition) a utilitarian endeavor. We can become uglier even as we become more successful.

That’s the start.  He then treks off into Adam and Eve, sex roles, and on and on.

The stuff about sex roles strikes me both as deeply wrong, but also in some way I cannot put my finger on, a lot more right than my current notions.

SPDI has a eulogy for femininity and a girl he knew.  I was touched.

It made me think of Barfield’s idea of the second consciousness–you start off innocent then you wise up then you wise up even more and intelligently and consciously work to reconstruct a non naive version of your innocence.

What would second femininity look like? I think it looks like trust.

Trust in people who are trustworthy. Trust in your family. Trust in your husband. Trust in your God.

And without need, there cannot be trust.

there shall be a great work in the land, even among the Gentiles, for their folly and their abominations shall be made manifest in the eyes of all people.

D&C 35:7

Revealing folly and abominations is a great work.  It is a form of greatness.  Why?

To paraphrase Confucius, all glory begins with the rectification of names.  Glory is a true appreciation of someone’s deeds.  So true glory comes from establishing the truth of each person and their deeds.  Glory consists of the merited love and praise we receive for our goodness.   But where anything depends on the perception of others there is a possibility of a gap between the perception and the thing perceived, love and praise where it is thought to be merited but it is not.

Bringing perception in complete union with reality is a task worth of a God.  Is this why the Holy Ghost, a member of the Godhead, interpenetrates?  Is this why the Atonement seems to involve a total communion between Christ and every man and woman?

Judgment therefore is a form of greatness and Judgment Day is not an arbitrary imposition but a necessary fulfillment of God’s nature and our need for true recognition.  Every kingdom is a kingdom of glory because everyone there knows in the presence of God that they had some worthy principle about them that He, the Almighty, found worthy.

In mortal terms, a father is someone who went from thinking it would be fun to gleefully and dangerously blow up stuff with his friends to thinking it would be fun to gleefully and a little less dangerously blow up stuff with his kids and his friends.

Mortal fathers, by natural design, have a lot of fun with their kids in the rough and tumble.

God is the Father.

(more…)

Reap.

Behold, the field is white already to harvest; therefore, whoso desireth to reap let him thrust in his sickle with his might, and reap while the day lasts, that he may treasure up for his soul everlasting salvation in the kingdom of God.

 Yea, whosoever will thrust in his sickle and reap, the same is called of God.

Therefore, if you will ask of me you shall receive; if you will knock it shall be opened unto you.

There is nothing to indicate here that harvest is a metaphor for missionary work alone.

The world’s field is overflowing with ripe excellences.  You only need to claim them as yours for God to claim you as His.  Ask, and He will give to you.  But you must ask with your whole soul.  You must ask with your time and with your deeds.

The more masculine I am, the more people respond to my compassion.  They eat that up.

Teddy Roosevelt. The older I get the more I admire the man.  Though he was a ham and a showman, like a better Donald Trump for a much better age.

Here he is on reading.  Some excerpts:

Now and then I am asked as to “what books a statesman should read,” and my answer is, poetry and novels — including short stories under the head of novels.

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why! there are scores and scores of solid histories, the best in the world, which are as absorbing as the best of all the novels, and of as permanent value.

The same thing is true of Darwin and Huxley and Carlyle and Emerson, and parts of Kant, and of volumes like Sutherland’s “Growth of the Moral Instinct,” or Acton’s Essays and Lounsbury’s studies

Parts of Kant!  Ha ha ha ha.  Oh, Teddy.

 I still read a number of Scott’s novels over and over again, whereas if I finish anything by Miss Austen I have a feeling that duty performed is a rainbow to the soul. But other booklovers who are very close kin to me, and whose taste I know to be better than mine, read Miss Austen all the time — and, moreover, they are very kind, and never pity me in too offensive a manner for not reading her myself.

Our challenges demand that we should be supermen of history, capable of resolving the crisis our age and place and constructing the new understanding. Nothing less will do than be iron men and saints.

We should be men with hearts full from the well-springs of tradition, but also with fierce eyes for the coming forms of life that lie over the horizon. We should have a dual orientation: both an immovable rootedness and the most expansive wanderlust.

-thus Rafael M.

Holy Pirate King or bust.

Being content is a gospel virtue.  In its superpowered form, contentment is gratitude.

Growth is also a gospel virtue.  Not just moderate, quiet growth.  It too must be superpowered.  Immoderate growth.  Progressing beyond all reason.  Insatiable ambition.

The man of God must have both. (more…)

The great secret is to relish greatly and yearn greatly.

Buddhists at least in the western Yoda-style version say you should try to get rid of your yearning because it causes you dissatisfaction with your current lot. Even in our own tradition dragons are miserable evil creatures because they always want to hoard more gold and/or fear losing what they already have.  So much so that they don’t enjoy the gold they lie on. It is the absence that drives them, not the possession.

Common sense tells us that its basic human character to feel dissatisfaction with what you currently have if you are desiring more than what you currently have. Ambition and contentment don’t play nice together.

But common sense lies.  It is possible. Everyone loves babies while still working to have them grow up. That’s ambition and contentment at the same time.  Part of the fun now is the potential they will grow into then.

The master man is the one who loves his little house and his little family, his small yard and his climbing rose . . . and who loves them like a Jove!

While in his mind’s eyes still seeing so vividly he can taste it, and working like a madman to achieve it, the great house on the hill with broad tree-dotted acres of lawn rolling down to the sea, where several generations of superb, aristocratic descendants come and go.  That vision is part of why he loves what he has now so madly.

Every man a holy pirate king! Gleefully running your gold through your hands, eyes glittering at the uncharted seas that still lie unplundered before you.

“Be still and know that I am God” while also daring all.

How He made you-

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Every man  a holy pirate king.

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Every woman  a necessity and a luxury.

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(from Admin:) two related posts–

Relish Greatly, Yearn Greatly

Ambition and Contentment

There is a piquant contrast between the little infant Jesus of his first coming and the all-conquering Christ of his Second Coming at the head of his legions of angels.

But the contrast is only apparent. The title Prince of Peace is not an oxymoron.

Peace is what comes through victory.

Only the complete and utter victor can offer true peace. You can know His power when you know His peace.

That night, that peaceful night, when he was born . . . it was peaceful because the Romans had pacified the area. It was peaceful because Mary had fought the fight of childbirth and had won. It was peaceful because the angelic hosts were swarming, a devil couldn’t so much as have sneezed.

Some reflections on Paul:

Paganism, or the Law, condemned weakness and praised strength.

The False Christ of Sin praises weakness and condemns strength.

The True Christ makes weak things strong.

The old virtue takes our nature as a given and commands us to do the best we can with it.

The vice tells us to deny our awareness that we are broken and pretend that our crookedness is straight.

The new virtue makes us something better than we are.

The stern  men of old say Know Your Place

The mocking devil says You are OK Just the Way You Are

Our Christ says Become as Gods and Angels