You realize that prayer takes us beyond the law. When you are praying you are, in a certain sense, an outlaw. There is no law between the heart and God. The law is outside our intimate relationship with God and if you bring a law into the intimate relationships with God, you mess things up. Between the soul and God there are no laws. But that is not a natural situation; it is the result of redemption, the result of Christ.[Thomas Merton in Alaska: The Alaskan Conferences, Journals and Letters]
(with thanks to Gabrielle)
1 comment:
I feel the truth of this reflection from time to time. How real acts of religion, e.g. prayers to God, vows to God, etc., push us into a space where we cannot be held by anything else. That's why it's always dangerous and subversive to pray, and why tyrants are always interested in taking over or destroying religion. Or, as in the case here in the U.S.A., inventing a civil religion with almost no content, as a kind of ersatz faith.
Good stuff, thanks for the reminder.
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