Wordspinning

father, son, and holy ghost

For a nontheist, I am unusually preoccupied with god.

For a Quaker-Unitarian I am unusually obsessed with the trinity.

An idea that made itself known during my yoga practice grew further during Quaker meeting several weeks ago.

As we finished our yoga postures, the teacher finished with her ritual "peace on our minds, on our lips, and in our hearts." and something in her intonation sounded like the Presbyterian minister at my grandma's church finishing his prayer with "father, son, and holy ghost."

I have also been reading a lot of the Gnostic gospels lately. Specifically Elaine Pagel's book Beyond Belief. Got me to thinking about how different Christianity would be if the Thomas Christian texts had been included in the bible. They believed (like the Quakers) that the divine was in everyone and that one needed to find a way to access that inner light.

In meeting I was meditation on the mind, body, spirit connection and suddenly it all fit together. If we are made in god's image and if god is a three-in-one being of father (mind), son (body) and holy ghost (spirit)... then our job is to become balanced three-in-one people. We too face the difficult paradox of being equally whole and separate.

I spent much of my life over-valuing the mind, undervaluing the spirit and devaluing the body. As a recovering anorexic (with over a decade of healthy eating under my belt!) I too often wanted to ignore my body. It sent unreliable signals to me about who I was.

Now in my spiritual practice I am striving for this mind/body/spirit connection. Trying to achieve balance that mirrors the image of this triune god.

posted by Kiara at 4:13 AM