[Oe List ...] Salmon: Sanctification (Golden pathways 1)

[Lawrence Philbrook]

Advent Prior's Council 

December, 1972




DOCUMENT ON SANCTIFICATION

HISTORICAL CONTEXT TIMES 

1. The world is bursting with resurgence. Ours is a time when men self consciously refuse to deal with the fact that the whole world is their responsibility and seek to escape from that fact through a seemingly apathetic, but actually tumultuous despair. The ever­present care is the cause of man's inner tumult which reminds him of what he already knows: the free raw creativity which is his life can be spent authentically rather than merely oozing away. It is our task to discern the occurrence of man's spending his total freedom in his societal setting, and to also discern the factor's that elicited his embracement of that state of being of sanctification. 


MOVEMENT 


2. The journey of a social movement begins with a radical awareness of the significance of human life, an enlightenment. Theologically speaking, this is the grasping of the divine justification of human existence. In later development, a movement defines what it understands to be the authentic living out of this justified life. This is the struggle with sanctification. In the post­modern era this living out of sanctification; 1. centers on the ontological reality of sanctification, not its moral desirability; 2. is articulated as objective decisional relationship to life, rather than interior virtues, and 3. is concerned with sociological reality, not psychological states. Signs that presently point to a sanctification trend in the movement are: 1. the struggle of galaxy pastors to embody symbolic roles in the church and galaxy, rather than simply attending galaxy meeting's; and: 2. the vocational decision by regional people to intern in the context of likely continuation with the Order rather than interning simply to "help out the region". 


EDGE 


3. The Spirit Movement has shifted from being compelled to experiment to an emphasis on demonstration. For instance, The Local Church Experiment is being pushed to be the demonstration of the new sociological form of the church. The 5th City experiment is moving toward the demonstration of primal community in the fifty­four Area Cities of the globe. The Order of the Ecumenical Institute is gradually taking the form of an established historical order. In each of these instances, demonstration calls for visible external signs of historically relevant accomplishment. Perhaps of even greater importance demonstration calls for the embodiment of the life of sacrificial engagement as the fulfilled life. It is this second facet of demonstration that is concerned with sanctification. As the Movement has pioneered in the contemporary articulation of the Christ Word, so now it must seek to recognize the embodiment of the authentic life deed when it occurs, discern the eliciting factors for that doing, and articulate the quality of that doing. In the self­conscious embracement of sanctification the movement will find that its style will be intensified and that as a body it will become a symbol of authentic human life in tihe present age. 


BENEVOLENCE 


4. Sanctification is understood in the three major poles of Universal Benevolence, Radical Integrity and Endless Felicity, wherein Benevolence stands at the pole of the Father. Universal Benevolence is the given context of the goodness of reality, which comes to man as the imposed dominion of all creation, the glory of his own creatureliness, and the boundless caring for all that is. Universal Benevolence is related to Radical Integrity as God handing over the universe to man, precipitating the obligation of radical care requiring risk­filled decision­making. Universal Benevolence is the weight that enables Felicity to have authenticity before all that is rather than before temporal human creations. 


5. Man in his fullness shows up with an incredible relationship to all of history, which claims his life to one of being consumed with the burden of the whole world. This obligation to all of creation comes as utterly impossible in light of man's human weakness. Yet man experiences himself as having unknown power and freedom to act, which leads to a compassion for every situation as he knows himself to be the one on whom the future rests.


6. Universal benevolence is that part of sanctification of unbounded good will coming as the indicative reality that the problem of the world; past, present and future, are my problems. This comes when you are confronted with the innocent suffering and identification as my own suffering as that of the world. Out of this is the awareness of my own self as born of humanity, finally claimed, and to be consumed by the burden of responding to all suffering. 


7. Man's glorious gift is his own humanness. As the burden of the imposed obligation becomes clearly that which can never be alleviated or fulfilled, man knows his finitude. Yet his human weakness is transformed allowing him to know that he has unbelievable power to be the one­­the Savior who has no excuses. It is similar to discovering a car on someone and finding yourself able to lift it­­ then realizing that there can never again be any excuse not to act. 


8. The third aspect in Universal Benevolence is a boundless caring, in which the sanctified man is propelled beyond himself to an active, ungratified care for all of creation. This state of selflessness is a state in which there is no predetermined significance for anything; there is only the liveliness present in the situation itself. The ghetto has its own possibility in the warm humanness of its dancing. The sanctified man sees and lives that possibility­­ that is selflessness. In fact to stumble upon this state is to find yourself hooked, unable to do trivia anymore. There is only a perpetual election to selflessness. To be drawn out of oneself is to be compassionate ontologically. It is to be one's selflessness in outgoing concern for his fellow man. 


9. Universal Benevolence is the occasion of stumbling into full humanness. The weight of pure being evokes raw humanness which creates the world. It is like getting your first job and doing it creates the only world you have. 


10. The initial awareness of the objective indicative reality of universal benevolence is the experience of the burden of the world being placed on your shoulders alone. The dynamics of imposed dominion are the disclosure that one is obligated to nothing less than the entire cosmos, which reveals the claim of all humanity on one's passion, illuminating the indicative resolve of being consumed in the burden of total responsibility. 


11. The sanctified man inherits cosmic obligation as the crush of receiving the whole universe on his shoulders and knowing that in living as the victor he is also the conquered one. Here he grasps that death awaits everyman and that there is no escape from the sentence of doom which has always been his. Out of this experience of doom he finds his sense of tragedy strangely turned away from man's dying rather than fixed upon his "not living''­­ the pathos of humanity. Here the universal identification is that all man's suffering is my own. It 's like entering the battle as general for the second time, knowing you're responsible and that the battle will never win the war. 


12. Finally claimed is the realization that one's whole life is held in fief to all mankind, to the humanizing process and the cause of humanness itself. Human born is the acceptance of the contingency of being; born on Planet Earth into naked raw humanity and the family of man, bearing the limitations, gains, and glories of mankind. Unconditionally owned is the realization that man's life is not his own, that his thoughts, words, deeds and whole being are for the sake of, and belong wholly to, the need of all mankind. Forever summoned is the experience of being forever on stage, on call, on tab, perpetually at the disposal of all mankind in the service of innocent suffering. Jesus wept over Jerusalem in radical identification with the human predicament of doom; he was forever surrounded by crowds, with no place to lay his head and continually summoned by the centurions of this world to heal sick children.


13. The sanctified man is consigned by the dominion over all creation imposed on him, and that s finally the only burden any man has to bear. He is eaten up by the fact of the continual, utterly absurd suffering of all of creation, which has become his own. and which he already has known he will never alleviate. Further, he experiences that he will never be released from his own watchfulness over the fragile journey of humanity, that his eyes are seared open in eternal vigilance. This phenomenon of every mans life can be seen during the New Orleans Hotel fire, as no one walked by without being drawn to it, helpless and yet compelled. 


14. The indicative resolves resulting from Imposed Dominion have to do with lying awake at night brooding; listening to the news with new dread; congressional prayer at the burden level, all the news happens on your block; you are both dreaded by and fascinated by living before the gaze of neighbor.


15. Man's creatureliness is both the gift and the giving of his life. This creatureliness is the disclosure of his pain­filled potential to take on his imposed dominion and to enact his innately boundless care. He knows his glorious creatureliness through the imposition of overwhelming demand, the transformation of his weakness and the opening of full freedom. 


16. The Impossible obligation is man's experience of sheer demand to participate in the social process, which in its overwhelmingness, constantly discloses his creaturely imperfection. Man finds impossible obligation in the primal empathy through which he stands in the struggle of all mankind throughout time to take on the unending formation of history. The inexhaustible potentiality is man's realization that in the midst of a seemingly impossible situation, such as the renewal of an inner city ghetto, an undeniable and inextinguishable creativity is called forth from within him. Consequently, the inevitable sacrifice is for everyman the certainty that his life will be given up in a particular way. The impossible obligation is manifested in the decision of parents who seek to give direction to children who in growing up will finally make their own judgements and set their own direction. 


17. Man's discoverer of himself as "creature" is a glorious breakthrough into the awareness that his weakness is transformed into new possibility. This transformed awareness is experienced as unbelievable power as he stands in one ambiguous situation after another that call forth this power. In his ever expanding awareness he apprehends a greater life found in the midst of his everyday encounter. Man is the vessel through which the inevitable flow of being channels the transforming power of history. Images and symbols are used by mass media and advertising to synthesize the flow of being that man experiences as their picture of the world. 


18. Everyman's essential nature is perfect freedom, which confronts the deep-seated story he tells himself that he is not really free and furthermore does not want to be. Perfect freedom becomes realized only when one finds that he is predestined to responsibility for all of creation. Becoming aware of the gift of freedom is like visioning the boundless possibility which looses the radical total, and unconditional call of his being. Nothing less than the world's savior, intense fear and fascination leave him naked before the fact that he alone is the universal resurgent. Truman saw and realized his perfect freedom in the decision of Hiroshima. 


19. As one becomes aware of his creatureliness in being given the cause of God, he is confronted by the impossibility of that obligation, which shows up his weakness. His weakness becomes transformed in the knowledge that what it means to be human is to be the weak one called to do the impossible. His perfect freedom is realized only in being put into this humanly impossible tension where his decision is possible. In a humanly possible situation? no impossible obligation, no weakness revealed, and therefore no freedom of decision exercised. Man's essential experience of creatureliness is his glory. 


20. Universal Benevolence finally issues in the state of existence of Boundless Caring. All the past and the future flood into a trembling present as man finds his creativity exposed and is thrown into his perpetual election to be the dead one he is. He is given the final humiliation of a compassion which he is helpless to silence. His benevolence is forever boundless­­ He cares for all. 


21. Boundless Caring shows up as exposed creativity even when despair and apathy abound. Creative caring is exposed in futile vigilance, is obvious actional insignificance, and in the self­conscious realization that finally all the caring that you can do is as nothing in the light of the need., and there is no assurance that any good will ever be accomplished, either immediately or finally. However, in the midst of exposed creativity, the sanctified man Just shows up with a given sense of vigilance over the primordial suffering of all creation, yet aware of the final futility and insignificance of acting out his care. When all meaning is stripped out of his caring, he is exposed to the radical pain of rebuilding the earth out over nothing. Only then can his caring finally be the sheer creativity which humanness is.


22. The sanctified life knows itself as perpetual election. "This is my beloved son" reveals Jesus as the exemplar of singular chosenness which is the universal experience in which each solitary decision reverberates a thousand destinies. I am the One. As absurd responsibility it picks up the burden of all while knowing everything is not enough. As sacrificial passion it seeks servant hood as the great opportunity to glorify God. Perpetual election sets its face toward Jerusalem.


23. One day man showed up having compassion he did not ask for and would rather not have ­­ it is an ontological givenness of humanness. Such a state of existence breaks loose in wracking agony over the absurd suffering of all men. Man is struck dumb by the helplessness experienced in the midst of the inability to release the passion in his neighbors life. It comes swiftly and unannounced like the whaling of a mother over her dead son; it remains like the humming of bees in your being. He is thrown into helpless humiliation in the face of this silent screaming that wracks his soul. In boundless care he becomes the servant guardian of the human race, all the while knowing that if he had a thousand deaths to give, he could not stop the cry or break the silence. 


24. Caring, exposed, elected ­­ the Sanctified man is boundlessly given permission to love God . His creative election spans all time and space or he stands on his nothingness and imposes with his agony a bridge over every abyss. His loving God is the pouring of his life in the social process, in the midst of which he discovers to his endless surprise that by such outpouring he has become the savior of God.


25. The Universal Benevolence aspect of sanctification is illustrated in the movie, "Hospital . " Dr. Box is overwhelmed to the point of suicide by his responsibilities in a collapsed hospital and by the disclosure of his weakness as a man, a father, and a doctor. His temptation is to escape to an idyllic mountain existence, hut he nevertheless decides, "Someone has to be responsible." 



INTEGRITY


The integral life is that lived in whole response to the actuality Of life. Such integrity is radical in that the actuality is disclosed through that lucidity possible only in the Word. When the vicissitude of life are seen as unusual benevolence that response of the sanctified man takes the form of radical integrity. The life on radical integrity participates in creation itself and in its actuality defines what happiness is.


27. The man who is radical integrity embodies boundless affirmation of no things less than the mystery itself. He understands his life to be a representational expenditure which is, through an immediate relationship to the Mystery, a sacramental deed on behalf of the neighbor. Because of his expenditure, life which is the life given by the incarnate word is radiated, and he is a Life giving presence to his situation. 


28. The man of radical integrity lives in boundless affirmation of the crushing life­disclosing event. He sees behind them the very source of his being and knowing that life will always be this way, he embraces it with gratitude and participates in all its events with passionate disinterest. Bound only to the mystery he is free to decide where he will expend his life. 


29 . The man of radical integrity knows his life to be representational expenditure. He receives his indicative from life itself and decides to be one of steadfast obedience. Being called to servant hood he recreates the role within himself and embodies the mystery as a sign Humanness 


30. The man of radical integrity is a life­giving presence to all men. Deciding to give up all self­significance he completely submits to the demand with an absurd confidence that has no basis in this world. With self completely given over he calls forth the divine power and transparently releases it. 


31. Radical integrity supplies the power dynamic to sanctification. Before the mystery itself life is lived out as the necessary deed to allow the neighbor to know the mystery and thus live his life, there no longer being any doubt that life is possible. 


32.Radical integrity has to do with the boundless affirmation of all that is, was and is to be. It is living before all existence with dogmatic monotheism, knowing it to be God's creation and activity. It is standing in decisional gratitude before the activity of God saying "Yes" to all. It is being the one who with passionate disinterest participates in the activity of God.


33. The stance of boundless affirmation begins with dogmatic monotheism in which historical encounter with the coming to be and the coming not to be of history is seen and named the activity of God. Choosing to trust no­thing but to be attentive always to that which is behind all things arrears as fanatic absurdity to relativists and hedonists. 


34. The self-conscious decision to live in gratitude for life's givenness enables a yes relationship to the perpetual change life is. This loyal service of final reality gives the sure hope that God will be God. 


35. The third aspect of boundless affirmation is passionate disinterest. The man of radical integrity is always confronted with a multitude of immediate demands. Standing present to the discerned activity of God enables him to transcend the immediate situation, thus enabling an obedient response.


36. Dogmatic monotheism gives a single focus to man's life allowing him to will one thing. Decisional gratitude makes him actively open to all that is. Passionate disinterest enables objective decision making as he forges the will of God.


37. Representational expenditure is the acting out of radical integrity. Without representational expenditure, boundless affirmation has no way to concretely manifest itself and life­giving presence would be seen as asceticism. It is the way in which a man gives form to radical integrity. Representational expenditure is manifested in three ways: in a man's steadfast obedience, his elected servant hood and his life being an incarnational sign. It gives self-conscious form to the pain of his lucidity. 


38. The man of radical integrity manifests representational expenditure first of all in his steadfast obedience. Obedience is continually responding to the necessities that become apparent in all significant encounters in life. Steadfast obedience exacts the pain of expenditure in response, which transforms suffering into joyful participation for the man of radical integrity. His steadfast obedience is manifest in the disciplined motivity that comes out of his commitment to one mission. Steadfast obedience is the way of the man of faith in response to the demands of the divine activity before which he stand perpetually grateful.


39. Elected servant sees his election and elects it himself. He personalizes the necessity into his own manifest destiny. He continuously works against his own self so that God's will and his brothers service can be performed. He concretely symbolizes giving his all and know that he stands totally responsible for all of life. This transparent servant thus shows what all men can do. 


40. Representational expenditure also involves its radical concretion in the midst of everyday life: the incarnational sign. this encounter is seen in the embodied vision, the physical specificity of an envisioned future that is found, in the man of radical integrity, in paper­mache. But incarnation is not just of the abstract or universal, it is also involved in the actualizing models ­­ it is the body on the line. Such manifestation vision and enacted models elicit from men their own possibility, requiring of them the decision to incarnate their own vision and models. Thus the incarnation sign is the particularity of expenditure on behalf of others which can no longer be discussed as abstract profession. 


41. The man of radical integrity, while he embodies representational expenditure embodies the inter dynamics: steadfast obedience, elected servanthood and incarnational sign. Embracing his steadfast obedience places him in the position to choose his historical role, where he claims his own election as the servant of all. As he embodies his elected servanthood, acting representationally he emerges as the incarnational sign. Being the incarnational sign, he offers that possibility to all men. If representational expenditure does not embody all three of the above dynamics it becomes either self­serving or self­conserving.


42. The radical integrity of sanctification is manifest in the life style of Life­giving presence which emerges from boundless affirmation and representational expenditure. The dynamics within that presence are 1) complete submission to mystery is that total rendering of one's being to be used as the mystery determines; i.e., Kazanzakis' Samuel says "I am his mouthpiece. He says to me speak and I speak. I am his hands, his feet, he says to me go and I go. 2 ) absurd confidence is that courageous dependence on groundless hope which is resolved on the basis of nothing; i.e., Jesus in three days I shall rise again from the dead 3) spirit. Transparent is becoming the contentless life which reveals the spirit deeps of every man, i.e., Jesus "and shall draw all men unto myself.' 


43. Radical Integrity issues from complete submission which is the embodiment of the radical awareness of the final limits of all creatures and the futility of living before anything. In complete submission to the final mystery there is the radica1 integration of life that dares to live before the final NO­THING. In the decision to completely submit one surrenders his own estimate of strength and embraces his weakness which becomes his strength. In complete submission one finds himself re­directing his will in accordance with the reality of the final power in history, thus becoming a manifestation of the life giving presence.


44. The man of radical integrity, stands in absurd confidence exemplifying his finitude and increasing dependence on that which is NO-THING. He is always resolving to hope where there is no hope, seeing live filled with possibility. His selfhood is released to allow the nonchalant style of absurd confidence. It is precisely in being the broken and dependent one he is, who dares to affirm the humanly impossible situation, that confidence is experienced as absurd. The selfhood released in such absurd confidence is an offense to the neighbor, yet is a sign of life­giving presence. 


45. Spirit transparency discerns the spirit issue in each situation, uses the necessary spirit discipline to push through every situation. In probing the deeps the man of radical integrity becomes a spirit address, a symbol of life to every man. 


46. When one is in complete submission his confidence is utterly absurd and he stands as the man of spirit through which men see God manifest. He is the symbol of life itself and in his presence men receive the gift of life. 


47. Radical integrity is the response of the wisdom of universal benevolence. In radical integrity dogmatic monotheism, steadfast obedience, and complete submission are found to be in relationship with each other through the knowing of the indicative. Likewise decisional gratitude, elected servanthood and absurd confidence represent the response to the above. The style is spelled out as passionate disinterestedness, incarnational sign and spirit transparency. Radical integrity forces an answer to the question of happiness as found in endless felicity. 


Felicity


48. The election to the chosen life is manifested through peace, joy and love in endless felicity. It is in the midst of this intensification of universal benevolence and radical integrity that one is both called and molded into problemless expenditure, glorious perseverance and perfect love. And it is here that not only is the veil rent and the gap between justification and sanctification traversed, but apostasy becomes consummation, brokenness is intentionalized through extraordinary assertion and submission in representing that which is; and the style of the contemporary saint becomes visible. 


49 . Endless felicity, the embodiment dimension of sanctification, outlines the life style for everyday living his calling. Endless felicity is the eternal fulfillment that comes when man throws his whole creatureliness into true breach of history. Endless felicity is problemless expenditure, glorious perseverance, and finally love. 


50. Problemless expenditure as the cruciform dynamic in endless felicity is the virtue which in its embodiment releases one from any external problems and therefore occasions chastity as glorious perseverance. Through the action of' problemless expenditure, perfect love becomes compassion and certitude. Finally it relates to the entire virtue of endless felicity by constantly calling us to authentic grounding in cruciform living.


51. The virtue or glorious perseverance is seen as the steadfast intentionality of the sanctified man as he lives the peace, joy and fulfillment of his given life. Only utter perseverance, allowing no thing to alter the deed, can actualize the problemless expenditure by which he exercises his benevolence towards all creation. In perseverance, he proclaims his perfect love and demonstrates the consummation of the Spirit which is his greatest gift. Perseverance is his glory for it is the power through which the sanctified man 's felicity becomes present in his existence. 


52. Perfect love is the intensification in endless felicity of problemless expenditure and glorious perseverance. It is the being dimension relative to the whole area of endless felicity and thereby completes the expenditure and perseverance. Perfect love is the discontinuous aspect of felicity which makes expenditure the destiny that is always worthwhile. It relates to perseverance by pushing, the doing of life to the deeps. Perfect love is embodied by Mountain Rivera as he decided to save the life of a friend by entering the wrestling ring which was obviously his decision to participate in the presence of being itself. 


53. Sanctification is being aware that ones total life is expenditure. It is glorious perseverance or living a life of vital reverence, of destinal resolve, and of victorious surrender. The life of sanctification is endless felicity. It is the laugh of the audience when Butch Cassidy jumps. It is Jesus commending his Spirit into the Fathers hands. 

54. Problemless expenditure is one of the virtues of the sanctified life in the dimension of endless felicity. The saint­man encounters no external problems as he expends his life, realizing that problems can only occur in how he decides to relate to his situation. He shows up broken, lacking skills and insufficient and yet gives thanks for the life he has on his hands. Faced with impossible demands, he internalizes his affirmation towards all of life and freely lives the pain that accompanies it. The sanctified life has only one certainty that is the expenditure of life in its most radical sense, in which life itself will provide all that is needed to expend ones existence. That he gives freely, wholly and completely as the cruciformed one, as illustrated by Jesus on the cross in the statement "forgive them for they know not what they do." 


55. Grateful inadequacy is the contingency dimension of problemless expenditure. Grateful inadequacy is first of all being obedient to the weakness one experiences under the burden of the world. It is secondly being unceasingly engaged as the weak one in history and finally is the offering to all of creation the humanly­frail existence that is. The Old Testament language expresses grateful inadequacy like this, the Lord gives, the Lord takes away. Blessed be the Lord.


56. Passionate suffering is the virtue of engagement in the dimension of problemless expenditure, which consists first of all of internalized doom. The taking into ones self the burden of the world, being the suffering and care of all men. The second dimension is passionate concern which is being the motivated one unto death on behalf of, for the sake of redeeming the suffering and care all men. The third dimension is painful dance which is embodying the suffering of all men and the passion for life present in all men in one radical style. Compassionate suffering is the presence in history of a style that raises to self­consciousness the cruciform principle that is endless life itself. Saint Francis of Assisi as he took into himself the doom of the aristocratic life­style manifested the virtue of compassionate suffering through his constant caring for all creatures (lepers included) and through his painful dance literally dancing in the streets and being stoned as a mad man).


57. The manifestation of endless felicity which is most evident in human style is that which issues forth from a stance of certitude in relation to ones destiny. This is realized in the raw affirmation of ones fated existence realized through the resolve to silently submit to whatever issues forth and visibly present through an embodied trust of the way life is which transforms fate into significant destiny. The certitude is in knowing that this destiny is in itself the fullness of life. Jesus referred to this in admonishing his disciples to rejoice not in their deeds but only in the fact that their name is written in heaven. 


58. Problemless expenditure in conclusion is the virtue which calls forth true gianthood that is only found in weakness, true service which is only found in suffering and the kind of healing stance that is only found in the appropriation of ones true destiny which is eternal insecurity. It is manifested only in one who has been driven through all pretensions or external enemies. Who can separate us from the love of Christ? Can trouble, pain or persecution? Can lack of clothes and food, danger to life and limb, the threat of force of arms? Indeed some or us know the truth of that ancient text . For their sake we are killed all the day long; we were accounted as sheep for the slaughter. No, in all these things we win an overwhelming victory through him who has proved his love for us.


59. Endless felicity is manifested in the virtue of glorious perseverance. The sanctified man approaches all things with a life­giving reverence full of fear and wonder. He acts with the courageous resolve that wells up from the depths of his being, making him a man of iron. Yet he knows that the final victory is always found in complete surrender to the Mystery which demands that there be distance from all things. Nothing daunts this man and his steadfastness is a marvel for all to behold. 


60. Vital reverence is the virtue of ever standing before the mystery as the only sustaining force in the universe, and thus being subsumed in dreadful honor, raptured fascination, and awefilled fidelity as decisional relations to the mystery. As one senses that that which slowly grinds his life to bits is also that which is the sole sustenance of life, he stands with the honor as of a son for his father, but approaches with the dread as of the convicted criminal for his executioner. And yet he is compelled to raptured fascination as he experiences the alluring appeal of that which is being itself within his being. As dread and fascination intensify to awe, he rests in the awefilled fidelity of one who falls and yet rises to fall again, in order to glorify the mystery. This vital reverence is exhibited by Sisyphus, who is sustained and yet expended by the mysterious power which gives him over to rolling the rock up the mountain again and again, which he does with unspeakable joy. 


61. Glorious perseverance also may he described as courageous resolve. The man who decides to participate authentically in the task of living continually encounters overwhelmingly difficult moments when he either can turn his back and renounce his authenticity or he can claim the prize, the victory, the imperishable wreath. This is his moment for courageous resolve. His life question, Will I win the battle or will the battle win me? portends his ultimate decision to establish the future, which he approaches directly in final conviction that no other purpose can claim his being. He moves in a confidence which is bound by neither time nor space, but is motivated by an unswerving, totally, self-expanding determination to conquer new frontiers of human possibility, and therefore, no­thing can change the direction. His thrust forward is like General Patton who against the recommendation powered a victorious blitz across Europe shocking the unsuspecting enemy into submission. 


62. The embodiment of glorious perseverance is victorious surrender. This points to the ultimate joy of victory which comes from fina1 surrender of the self to all of life. In the first instance this surrender manifests itself in eschatological nonchalance which neutralizes both success and failure, allowing every deed to be rendered up to history. Secondly this surrender is graceful resignation that is the resolute beatitude for life arid presents all human activity in a radical context of servanthood. Finally, this surrender is the seed bed of detachment that allows the victorious triumphs of man's life to be actualized for in this detachment one goes beyond the moral giving permission for responsibility to be for the world. Victorious surrender is seen in the crucifixion of Jesus, a deed performed in blind obedience, with open eyes and a joyous heart. 


63. Glorious perseverance is the virtue that maintains a person in the un-ending constancy of care for the creation. It is that virtue, finally, which allows one to stand when all others say it is hopeless, for they have not surrendered their deeds to history itself. President Nixon exhibited this virtue when after having lost the presidential election of 1964, the California gubernatorial election of 1966, heavily economically burdened with financial commitments, and unable to secure a position with law firms in California, he left the west coast and what seemed to be the end of his political and public career. Then on the east coast he secured a position with a firm and situated himself in close proximity to the political life of Washington, so that he successfully ran for president in 1968 and again in 1972 having accumulated one of the largest pluralities in history. 


64. Perfect love is the ultimate virtue of the sanctified life, composed of the minor virtues of inexhaustible compassion, everlasting loyalty, and ecstatic presence. Inexhaustible compassion is perfect love's response to the spiritual suffering of men trapped in the doom of this world. The sanctified man manifests perfect love by embracing the cause of being itself with everlasting loyalty. Ecstatic presence is the depth of perfect love and the foundational virtue of standing present to the cry or the suffering world. An illustration of this virtue might be the efforts of Caesar Chavez to better the life of the farmer workers in which his fasting, his sustaining of the long battle and the catalyzing of the labor union manifest the virtue of perfect love.


65. Perfect love manifests itself through inexhaustible compassion, in which it becomes clear that replenishment and expenditure are two sides of the same reality, or that care for the neighbor means openness toward the Mystery in which all creatures have their being. One dimension of this compassion is expansive concern, in which the arena of concern is always being enlarged by growing awareness. Secondly, perpetual sacrifice is the activity of constantly deciding to be expended. Trusting only in the inexhaustibility of spiritual reality. Thirdly, transcendent anguish is the intentional transformation of human tragedy into ontological meaning. This inexhaustible compassion is illustrated in Hammersjold's persistence when his task was thankless and apparently hopeless.


66. Felicity in sanctification where perfect love of being becomes visible, can also be described as everlasting loyalty. Such loyalty bears constant witness to the reality of life in prophetic truthfulness, revealing always the way life is. This unquestioning loyalty with a committed will, gives itself in unrelentless compassion in creating the necessary structure of care and in revealing the mystery of life in all situations. It not only wills this but gives itself totally in valorous slavery to the singleness of will. Such loyalty might be pointed to in Dietrich Bonhoeffer's decision to return to Germany and die even though he had opportunity to extricate himself from the affair. 


67. Ecstatic presence is the underlying virtue manifested in the intensification of inexhaustible compassion and everlasting loyalty. It is first the consuming restlessness that comes from responding to the cries of brothers doomed to die. Secondly, it is seen in the presence on the stage of history of the cosmically commissioned one, self­elected to assume responsibility for creating the face of being in his life. The depth of ecstatic presence is the levitational silence of the pause before the return from the center of being. Ecstatic presence finally is the embodied radiance of Gautama the Buddha, who, having known his own justification, now sees himself commissioned to care for the resurgence of mankind. 


68. Mahatma Ghandi manifested perfect love in the way his life was stylized in response to the necessity of creating the future of India. The inexhaustible Compassion was seen in the multitude of battles he fought, and the endless concerns of the masses that he shouldered. Time and again he used his own death as the weapon to call forth the people to claim their destiny. Everlasting loyalty was demonstrated by a fast that nearly ended in death over his insistence that India not be divided into two nations. Finally, the ecstatic presence could be seen in Gandhi's power to stop massive rioting by his presence, or to catalyze a massive movement by a single symbolic act (the Salt march) directed at the heart of the social contradiction. 


69. Finally, Endless Felicity is the happiness of sanctified man's total fulfillment in embracing his destiny to responsibly care for the spirit deeps of his fellow man sensing the full weight of this worlds woe, the sanctified man allows himself to have only civilizational problems. Having had his own personal integrity laid bare in the face of this world's demands, sanctified man dares to persevere gloriously on behalf of all mankind. 




FURTHER IMPLICATIONS


EXPERIENCE 


72. Our experiences in the past two days has given us fascinating glimpses of the move to grasp sanctification at this moment of the Great Turn. One of these is the participation of sanctification in the recovery of the Other World. It appears that sanctification may provide or even itself be the mythology that allows the visitor to the Other World to be rooted in the present social form and thus re­engage this world with all his lucidity. Other fascinations were discovered in the potential to recapture yet another dimension of our heritage such as singing long discarded hymns; re-examining the classic "faith and works polarity and creating a new biblical exegesis. Prayer in its relationship to doing also holds a promise of new discovery as does other elements of the New Religious Mode. The practical manifestations of living out of a global context have become more urgent with the release that comes with the bursting of resurgence. 



JUSTIFICATION 


73. The psalmist is the window that begins to reveal the distinction between justification and sanctification as we have talked about it. The saved man who knows his crummy life to be loved by God is catapulted into the awareness that the offense of disobedience comes at the point of refusing to manifest the implications of his salvation, that is, its dependence upon the salvation of every other man. That is Universal Benevolence to decide what it looks like to take on oneself the burden of every man. Similarly his anger over the apostasy he knows within himself is the refusal to trust the constancy of God ­ to "love His law!' ­ to '"follow His decrees'". Radical Integrity is to live out the faith decision in every situation , that God has made no mistake. Therefore, the moment one discovers God as friend (under the rubric: with God as friend, who needs an enemy) he becomes a friend of God, loving what God loves, hating what God hates, which is the revelation of His glory. 



JESUS


74. The future implications of sanctification is the way we appropriate the person of Jesus as the exemplar of the Godly life, just how the incarnation of the Father gets disclosed in His life and teachings, and carefully discerning how He stood with radical integrity as the truth, the way, and the life for all of humanity. The rediscovery of the power of Jesus as sheer symbol that moves beyond the category of style will mean the creation of another (scripture methodology) that discloses Jesus as the door, or entrance to the Holy Life through which all of humanity can self­consciously pass. This methodology will push toward a new image of the Life of Jesus in the context of sanctification and when seen at the sociological level will be the key to the social process, the creation of the new earth, and the new form of human life in the post modern world. 




December 31, 1972


SANCTIFICATION


THE QUALITIES OF PERFECT LOVE


INTRODUCTION 

The qualities of the one who has said "yes" to his experience and demand of perfect love are an absurd chastity' compassion that is inextinguishable, joyous circumconsciousness and a destinal loyalty to his very being and the mystery of life. 


I. The man of absurd chastity shows up with all he needs which is nothing. He is then free to dogmatically engage in history with single­minded passion as the surprising powerful weak one. When Thomas Becket was made Archbishop of Canterbury in 1170, he resigned the Chancellorship of England, gave all his possessions to the poor and with single­minded passion defended the honor of God against the rising force of European nationalism using the only weapon he had, his death. His death allowed the high civilization of the Middle Ages to flower where it might otherwise have withered in the bud. 


II. Joyful circumconsciousness has to do with perceiving phenomena as being interrelated in infinite pattern and with perceiving thought processes as wildly intuitive synthesis. Heightened awareness of the outside world comes with the awareness of oneself as part of a totally interrelated universe, which at the same time occasions internally trans- verbal contemplation, a mode of intuitive, nonverbal, yet conscious thought critical for positing oneself authentically in such a universe , which contemplation culminates in selfless celebration, the experience of losing oneself as entity and finding oneself anew as the dynamic of love. A statement reflecting all the rubrics of joyful circumconsciousness coming from a Woodstock participant follows: "It was just clear, in a way I can't explain, that whatever was going on there, it didn't have to do primarily with my age, but that older people there experienced the same experience, and that everybody around the world was changed for that happening."


III. The qualities needed for the man of perfect love include inextinguishable compassion. This compassion manifests itself in a willing servant of God with infinite passion who knows himself as the perpetual revolutionary who is unendingly spilling out his life. In the face of the possibility of total obliteration, the North Vietnamese nation as a body demonstrates the quality of inextinguishable compassion for the whole world and particularly for the United States by audaciously saying no to American domination and by continually holding the United States over against the vision of its founding fathers, as seen in Ho Chi Minh's New Year messages to the United States, reminding that country of its own constitution, on which North Vietnam is based. N. Vietnam acts as the willing servant of the rest of the World, constantly revising its models and objectives in its demonstration of the role of perpetual revolutionary; exhibiting infinite patience over decades of battle; and finally willing the unending spilled outness of its life and resources as a sign of that compassion.


IV. The one who has said "yes" to his experience and demand of perfect love senses and is loyal to the beckoning of history and his role in shaping the future. He lives the forbidden life as he affirms the whole of his life and every situation of it. He experiences terror in this world, but knowing his final accountability is to God for the world, he acts out of fear of God only and not out of fear of men. Affirming life, fearing God and being endlessly devoted to history results in a man who acts out his life's purpose with his being. The quality of destinal loyalty was demonstrated by Pope John XXIII in his recapture of the meaning of Roman Catholicism for the common man. He denied no part of the traditional teachings, but fearing only God and not the Curia, he devoted his efforts to returning the faith to the common layman, and demonstrating his life's purpose with his whole being by having the Mass translated into everyman's language and extending the hand of ecumenism across the globe. 

Advent Priors Council 

SANCTIFICATION DOCUMENT 

December 1971


  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: William Salmon 
  To: Order Ecumenical Community 
  Sent: Thursday, September 18, 2008 2:55 AM
  Subject: [Oe List ...] Salmon: Sanctification


  I remember OE had a paper of sanctification. Let me check my files to see what I have. OK? Pastor Bill 
    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: David Walters 
    To: Order Ecumenical Community 
    Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2008 1:19 PM
    Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] Sanctification


    There is a chapter in Brother Joe on  Sanctification. 

    David Walters
      ----- Original Message ----- 
      From: James Wiegel 
      To: Order Ecumenical Community ; dialogue at wedgeblade.net ; Bill Grow ; billgrow at igc.org ; Nan Grow ; nangrow at verizon.net 
      Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2008 12:36 PM
      Subject: [Oe List ...] Sanctification


            Anyone have the categories to describe sanctification and the dark night and long march

            just finishing a week long pilot of a new method and the core group might find it helpful poetry.

            jim wiegel

            Beverly Way 
            Tolleson, Arizona 85353-2401
            +1 623-936-8671
            +1 623-363-3277
            jfwiegel at yahoo.com
            www.partnersinparticipation.com

            One great, strong, unselfish soul in every community could actually redeem the world. Elbert Hubbard

            --- On Tue, 9/16/08, Lifeline248 at aol.com <Lifeline248 at aol.com> wrote:

              From: Lifeline248 at aol.com <Lifeline248 at aol.com>
              Subject: [Oe List ...] Let us sing
              To: oe at wedgeblade.net, dialogue at wedgeblade.net
              Date: Tuesday, September 16, 2008, 5:45 PM


              Dear Colleagues,
              Interesting dialogue and listing of songs.  The Sept. 22nd Newsweek arrived today, and on pp. 58 ff. is another fascinating dialogue entitled Sing, Brain, Sing.  I had trouble downloading the first of two pages --imagine my surprise to see Sun Tzu--but the second page was not on the Newsweek webpage.  So here is half of the article as an attachment.  Enjoy.  
              Today, BTW, is Richard and my 30th wedding anniversary.  We were married across the street from the Philadelphia RH at 38th and Chestnut, many colleagues in attendance, with our families from Mass. and NH.  Our adopted (at six) twin sons, Dan and Dave, will be 31 next month and we have four beautiful grand-children (two apiece) ages 2, 3, 5, 9.  The years have flown by.  Life is good.  Let us sing.
              Grace, Peace, and Love,
              Lucille Tessier Chagnon

              Lucille T. Chagnon, M.Ed.
              Literacy Acceleration Consultants
              6448 Arbor Lane - P O Box 438
              Chincoteague Island, VA 23336-0438
              757-336-5047 fax -1391
              cell 302-561-4575
              e-mail: lifeline248 at aol.com
              www.teachtwo.net




              **************
              Psssst...Have you heard the news? There's a new fashion blog, plus the latest fall trends and hair styles at StyleList.com.
              (http://www.stylelist.com/trends?ncid=aolsty00050000000014) 
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