Return of the Magi

Lately, the Holy Spirit is in the air. Emotional energy is swirling out of the earth.I can feel it bubbling up, effervescing and evaporating around us, still barely percolating to the surface. Storms loom.

 

 

Plus, a bunch of weird coincidences keep happening to me.

For a long time, one of my sayings has been that intelligence is common, wisdom is rare.

"It has yet to be proved that intelligence has real survival value."

-Arthur C. Clarke

That's much better.

God, Christ. Magic. 42. Spirituality. You can hike mountains for it, catch a groove playing music, see it in an equation or in supplication to Y*weh. Spells of the moon and alignment of the planets - all of them call you softly at first. This energy, whatever YOU call it, has been growing.

The drumbeat to feel instead of think is getting louder. Submit to the flow. Submit to the obvious flow. Submit to your God, and feel the winds whipping outside, knowing that magic is returning.

I know it's not just me. I don't just see this happening. In fact, I don't see it at all.

I taste the change. I can feel it in my feet.You do too. You hear pumping in your blood. There's a rumbling deep within whatever you call God, and it's building. The lifting of a lid, beyond understanding; a wildness sparking everywhere. The terrifying sense of obligation, of calling, of reckoning, of being called to face the truth that is getting louder.

It's not that the veil is lifting. We aren't MORE clear about what to do. Or what is happening. On the contrary, the confidence and certitude of youth are slipping away as we enter the dark woods of our culture's first test of mortality. The first test of less. The first step to death. Here there be dragons.

First Reading 

Sunday, November 12th

Wisdom 6:12‐16

Wisdom is bright, and does not grow dim.

By those who love her she is readily seen,

and found by those who look for her.

Quick to anticipate those who desire her, she makes herself known to them.

Watch for her early and you will have no trouble;

you will find her sitting at your gates.

Even to think about her is understanding fully grown;

be on the alert for her and anxiety will quickly leave you.

She herself walks about looking for those who are worthy of her

and graciously shows herself to them as they go,

in every thought of theirs coming to meet them.

The collective Me, the We, is a thing I am inextricably tied up in despite my petulant protests. And that We, that Us, is leaving it's teenage years behind and entering the cold world a very foolish and unprepared young man.

This is no particular indictment of Us, of me, of you. This is always the way, and We were spoiled in many ways, soft hands from soft times, through no fault of our own. Summer turns to fall, and this is Mother Earth's power, not ours. Her domain, and we are merely her children. We don't change the seasons, or the way we react to them. The magic is us, and the foolishness and hope of spring is a delight to be treasured, not a sin to be scolded.

 

We can only change from being a silly teenage boy as a culture by getting our ass handed to us by the Universe. By God. By Fall. Whether we end up redeemed or not.

[A] 2011 study in Emotion, based on four experiments, found that focusing on feelings versus simply focusing on details can actually lead to “superior objective and subjective decision quality for complex decisions.” As a result, the study concludes that “affective decision strategies may be more effective relative to deliberative strategies for certain complex decisions.” 

 

How do you live a good life? Can it be planned, thought through? Or do you need to dive in with raw passion, leaving it to God and following the stream where it takes you?

The witch knows, though the initiate does not, that she will get three times what she gave, so she does not strike hard.

 

To push on the universe is to claim magic as your own. Is it even possible to leave the spells to the gods?


Sources

 

https://catholicmassreadings.com/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_of_Three_(Wicca)

https://www.dailyartmagazine.com/on-the-move/
https://quoteinvestigator.com/2019/01/11/survive/