Courage, Temperance, Prudence, and Justice.
- heather
- Mar 16
- 11 min read
Good day, good people,
As we take up our collective Lenten preparation—by way of moving into the larger mind, fasting, praying, and almsgiving—with our attention in cultivating, transmitting, and perhaps even wielding the four cardinal virtues this season, let us see our work as a imaginal activism (a term from Cynthia Bourgeault). This is a way of being in this world but not entirely of it (John 17:14-16)—being of this world and simultaneously of other worlds, namely the imaginal world. It is easy to become caught up in this world with our selfhood stationed in what Cynthia Bourgeault calls our ordinary egoic operating system and an orientation towards what Thomas Keating called the emotional programs for happiness.
From the egoic operating system, these emotional programs for happiness drive us unconsciously, shaping our pursuit of core human needs and desires—safety, security, survival, approval, affection, esteem, power, control, and influence. These human needs and desires are not inherently bad or wrong, nor should we avoid pursuing and enjoying them when possible. However, when they take hold on our interior freedom and we become overly identified with or attached to them, the lens of the spiritual organ of our hearts becomes clouded, making it difficult to see clearly divine Reality.
From an early age, these emotional programs are deeply embedded in our thoughts, emotions, and sensations, shaping our approach/avoidance system and influencing our actions and decisions far more often than we have the the capacity to recognize. We often assume we are free, yet these programs are open and running behind the scenes, making us mechanical as we unknowingly buy into their agendas and seek their fulfillment. Through an ongoing commitment to spiritual practice, we develop the capacity to see ourselves under the influence of these programs.
As we grow in awareness, we gain access to another operating system within from which there is enough space to see these programs in action to turn the direction we are looking for happiness (Thomas Keating's definition of repent). From this deeper selfhood, we have the chance to reorient ourselves beyond the trapped mind, to include our Whole Self and our post within the ray of creation. We can open to and place ourselves under the influence of the four cardinal virtues—or imaginal substances—of Courage, Temperance, Prudence, and Justice which the Stoics saw as the hinge to all other virtues.
As we open to Courage, we discover the fortitude and strength—both within and beyond—that enable us to stand firm amidst fear, difficulties, and the pull of the emotional programs for happiness such that they no longer have such a lasting hold on us.
As we open to Temperance, we put ourselves under the sway of discretion, the ability to know "the right amount" (as Plato said) of anything we might consume—whether it be food, drink, goods, news, or other influences—to avoid excess and imbalance.
As we open to Prudence, we fertilize insight, foresight, and the ability to discern what is truly happening beneath the surface where others might only look and to determine "the appropriate course of action to be taken in a given situation, at the appropriate time, with consideration of potential consequences."
As we open to Justice, we find the middle way—balancing concern for our own benefit, pleasure, and well being with awareness of its impact on others—moving us into impartiality and equitability.
Working with these four imaginal virtues also seems to prepare us for the capacity to bring forth Metis. Cynthia Bourgeault describes Metis as appropriate, skillful, decisive three-centered action that supports the moment as it unfolds and is never premeditated. She has spoken of the dangerous shortage of Metis (along with most of the imaginal nutrients) right now and has encouraged all who can to step up and bring it forward.
Perhaps this is what we are truly preparing ourselves for.
With Courage, Temperance, Prudence, and Justice,
Heather
Readings from last week's Daily Contemplative Pauses
*All previous readings & reflections can be found here*
Monday, March 3rd with Heather
Reading: “It pervades everything so that this Presence—my favorite word for God—is in everything without being limited to anything. It just is. This is the Mystery that has created us with such great love so that each of us is primarily God or at least participating in God before we are anything else.” — Thomas Keating, God is All in All: The Evolution of the Contemplative Christian Spiritual Journey
Chant: I am Present to the Presence, it is my only care, I am held by the Presence, the fountain of creative love (by Kristy Christian)
Wednesday, March 5th with Heather
Reading: “To repent is not to take on afflictive penances like fasting, vigils, flagellation, or whatever else appeals to our generosity. It means to change the direction in which you are looking for happiness. That challenge goes to the root of the problem. It is not just a bandage for one or another of the emotional problems.
“If we say yes to the invitation to repent, we may experience enormous freedom for a few months or for even a year or two. Our former way of life, in some degree, is cleaned up and certain relationships healed. Then, after a year or two, the dust stirred up by our first conversion settles and the old temptations recur. As the springtime of the spiritual journey turns to summer—and fall and winter—the original enthusiasms begin to wane. At some point, we have to face the fundamental problem, which is the unconscious motivation that is still in place, even after we have chosen the values of the gospel.” — Thomas Keating, Invitation to Love
"Blessing the Dust: For Ash Wednesday" by Jan Richardson
So let us be marked
not for sorrow.
And let us be marked
not for shame.
Let us be marked
not for false humility
or for thinking
we are less
than we are
but for claiming
what God can do
within the dust,
within the dirt,
within the stuff
of which the world
is made,
and the stars that blaze
in our bones,
and the galaxies that spiral
inside the smudge
we bear.
Thursday, March 6th with Chris
Reading: 'A Wild Becoming' by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer
And then came the day I discovered
a sky full of birds inside and around me,
all of them singing love, love, love.
Around my shoulders appeared
a cloak of stars going supernova.
In my womb swirled a chorus of waves.
How could I not have known I was
growing a crown of antlers?
How could I have missed
my whole life has been preparing me
to transform who I am for love?
Now all I want is to open enough
to let love do with me what it will.
I want to be in service to the radiance
that even now begins to shine through.
I want to lose what I thought I knew
of my story. And though fear is also here,
I want to surrender to the strange
and insistent voice of love saying,
These are the gifts you’ve been given.
Now, sweetheart, now, be the change.
Chant: O Mercy, I entrust myself to you, that I may be transformed (by Suzanne Toolan RSM & Catherine Regan)
Friday, March 7th with Catherine
Reading: 'Prayer of St. Francis' - for Lent
Lord, [Holy One] make me an instrument of your peace:where there is hatred, let me sow love;where there is injury, pardon;where there is doubt, faith;where there is despair, hope;where there is darkness, light;where there is sadness, joy.O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seekto be consoled as to console,to be understood as to understand,to be loved as to love.For it is in giving that we receive,it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Chant: Pour out through me God of glory, God of grace, that all may see, thy eternal radiant face (by Darlene Franz)
Saturday, March 8th with Catherine
The Welcoming Prayer as a Lenten practice of freedom from our programs for happiness and freedom to feed our world with the gifts of the Spirit
There are three movements of the prayer:
• Feel and sink into what you are experiencing this moment in your body.
• “WELCOME” [or Witness] what you are experiencing this moment in your body as an opportunity to consent to the Divine Indwelling.
• Let go by saying “I let go of my desire for security, affection, and control and embrace this moment as it is.”
Chant: Seek yourself in me, seek me in yourself (by Darlene Franz)
Sunday, March 9th with Chris
Reading: 'The Beauty of Chaos'
“We try so hard to put order into our lives and into the cosmos. There is none; instead, there are lots of comings and goings, ups and downs. In fact, everything at the subatomic level is chaos. Moments of perfect order coalesce only to dissolve again into the thrilling immensity of infinite possibilities. Love is all because it is nowhere, not in one place, but everyplace. Every form is teeming with life and with various forms of consciousness or no consciousness. Like bees swarming or in a hive, or ants on an anthill, life on every level is busy. Yet it’s doing nothing – remaining for a moment and then quickly passing away, only to be back in another form, in another kind of community, in another chaos. Chaos is our home. It is always becoming, ending, and starting anew.
“Everything moves but in no particular direction. It just is, always changing, becoming something new; always together with everything else; dependent and interconnected; differentiating yet always the same; fusing, one-ing, never still; always in relationship to everything. Only love remains.
“We are a certain openness to being everything and nothing, both at once and in all that is in-between. This is God in us and we in God. This is eternal life, shared in common with all other creatures in an infinite variety of ways.
“Nothing really matters because everything matters and is happening at the same time. Nothing is remembered or forgotten. It is all here at once. Everything is in movement, going nowhere but enjoying everywhere and everything. This is creation: endless, delightful, unpredictable, unbelievable; just is-ness and is-ing playing with goodness, beauty, and truth; without purpose, without plan, without judgement; in perfect peace in the midst of activity and no activity.
“To be in a relationship is to accept everything and to resist nothing. It welcomes enemies and makes them the best of friends, whether they be people, angels, demons, problems, difficulties, pain, suffering, or desolation. All is in the void, which is the safest place in all creation, where gratitude, freedom, and pure love reign supreme." — Thomas Keating, Reflections on the Unknowable, Chapter 28
Monday, March 10 with Joy
Reading: "The Christian experience of awakening and of unity consciousness is a true Oneness that involves the full participation of our humanity, body, soul, and spirit, distinct from the divine nature, but totally absorbed with the realization of God in the degree that God wills for each of us. A corollary of this, is the importance of cultivating an awareness and conviction of the Divine Indwelling. That is really the source and root of the spiritual life: It is here so we do not have to become anybody. We already are all that we can be. When there is nobody to become, how free we will be! We only have to be what we are already, which is the creature and the beloved child of God. …
It is a simple program, but hard to do. All you have to do is nothing. It does not mean that you actually do nothing. It means that you are empty of self-conscious motivation but open to God’s action, so that you do what [God] wants to do. Emptiness is not nothingness, but emptiness with an openness to becoming everything." — Thomas Keating, That We May Be One
Chant: Put the mind in the heart, in your current state of being. With the mind in the heart, all is whole. (by Joy Andrews Hayter)
Tuesday, March 11th with Joy
Reading: "We can be profoundly at peace and create a context of peace for others, surrounding them with caring love and listening attentively to the communication of their hearts, if we ourselves are in touch with the Source of peace and are acting out of that Source. … We can do this by regularly making time to let everything else go, and rest in the Source at the center of our being. … The contemplative experience of God … will lead to a world where there will be no one to fight …in a word, to a new level of consciousness." — M. Basil Pennington, A Place Apart
Chant: Be quiet, be quiet, for this day is holy. And do not be grieved and do not be grieved for the joy of the Lord is your strength. (by Henry Schoenfield)
Wednesday, March 12th with Joy
Reading: "The awakened state or the non-dual does not think about right and wrong, because such persons are always doing what is right, because they are under the direct influence of the Spirit. So, there’s no need to think of self or the past or to worry about the future but only of now. … non-duality is really dual consciousness in which you are able to give your whole attention to the duties or expectations or what the senses are telling us with all the distractions of life, while at the same time never leaving this conviction – which is not so much an experience – as something beyond experience, a certain certitude that you’re always in the presence of God and then you can see God in different things, whatever the Spirit may suggest.
“… we stop making efforts to remain in the presence of God and just take everything as it comes. This is to be in the present moment. That’s the only place God is. So, if you’re there too, then all you have to do is to accept what’s happening, or do what God wants you to do about what’s happening, believing that you will be guided regardless of how many faults you have. And, in fact, you may rather like your faults, because they keep you humble.
“So, what’s the point of living? As far as I can see, it’s to give God the chance to take over our very complicated human lives and situations completely. Whatever we do is in the service of that project. We don’t have to think about it if we are in the present moment. It is happening." — Thomas Keating, That We May Be One
Chant: We are held in Love, we are One in Love (by Joy Andrews Hayter)
Friday, March 14th with Heather
Reading: “This presence, once established in our inmost being. might be called spaciousness. There is nothing in it but a certain vibrancy and aliveness. You're awake. But awake to what, you don't know. You're awake to something that you can't describe and which is absolutely marvelous, totally generous, and which manifests itself with increasing tenderness, sweetness, and intimacy.” — Thomas Keating, From the Mind to the Heart
Chant: Come to me, all you heavy burdened ones, and I will give you rest (by Henry Schoenfield)
Saturday, March 15th with Heather
Reading: “Eight hundred years ago, the theologian and mystic Abu Hamid al-Ghazali asserted: Human perfection resides in this, that the love of God [Reality, the Source of Life, the Most Subtle State of Everything] should [come over] the human heart and possess it wholly, and even if it does not possess it wholly, it should predominate in the heart over the love of all things.
“...The love of God is the love of the greatest Truth. This quest concerns Reality, not religion. The 'love of God' is our essential relationship with what is most real.” — Kabir Helminski, The Knowing Heart
Chant: In love alone, I take my rest, I dwell, unafraid. In love alone, we take our rest, we dwell, unafraid (by Kirsty Christian)
Sunday, March 16th with Heather
Reading: “When one whole human being meets another whole human being, there is no antagonism. Even if there is difference, there is respect, because the wholeness of one is not in conflict with the wholeness of the other.
“According to the testimony of the most mature human beings, we have the potential for knowing all of Being, all of Reality. We can know, embrace, and participate in this transpersonal Reality. Further-more, this whole Reality is the electromagnetic field of love.
…
I've heard it said there's a window that opens between heart and heart, but if there are no walls, there's no need even for a window.—RUMI
“The reality of the moment can be summarized simply as: Being in becoming, a total field of Oneness unfolding, Love knowing itself. The reality of ourselves can be summarized as: we are integral to this reality, not just a part of it, but one with it. We are not a part of the whole, we are the whole. The human being is all of Being, the drop that contains the Ocean.” — Kabir Helminski, The Knowing Heart
Chant: Become a Whole world, for a Whole world, Be ye Whole as I am Whole, be ye Whole as I am Whole (by Darlene Franz)
Comments