A Map of Reality

Humans want to know what's real, what's reality, what's true. We have explored the outside world and our inner worlds for millennia, and we seem to still not be sure what is absolutely real. I think the issue might be that what is really real is not something that can be seen or communicated through language at our dualistic level of perception. We have to transcend duality experientially and consciously in order to know the "really real," sometimes called the Nondual, the One, the Real, the Absolute, or God. Perhaps only at that level of consciousness may we come to truly know what is ultimately Real and True.

Mary Magdalene (2018) and her Witness of Christ and the Kingdom

A few days ago I had the opportunity to see the film Mary Magdalene (2018), which is a biblical drama of the ministry of Jesus, taking interest in the person of Mary Magdalene, as she may have seen it from her point of view. It depicts how she resists the status quo of her family and traditional society, how she is looking for deeper meaning in her life, and how she comes to be a follower of Jesus.

Christians are Made Christs by Anointing

The ritual practice of anointing makes the person that is anointed an "Anointed One," which is what the word Christ literally means, and by derivation is what being a Christian means. Cyril of Jerusalem in the fourth century noted of those who had been baptized and anointed, "You have been made Christs, by receiving the anti-type [symbol] of the Holy Spirit [the oil]" (Catecheses 21.1). Receiving the chrism they are ritualistically made Christs, being clothed in that Name and Identity, taking it upon themselves in actual fact as their own Eternal Identity, their True Name/Self.