2009 04 10

The Sunday Morning The Church of ATTENTION

A Good Friday Edition

            What’s good about a day the hero of the Christian world gets nailed to a cross?

I prefer Good Friday as a metaphor, not a human and a tree being joined. Our language tries to evolve verbs into strange states. ‘Being nailed’ can be slang for sex, being drunk, clinching a sales presentation, there was even a bowling ball called The Nail. The term is ‘nominalization’, a verb/action being transforming into a state, as if the verb becomes cemented. As if an action could be a state of being, a noun.

The mention of a ball throws me into the multiple meanings, ‘having a ball’ ‘toss me the ball’ and an old favorite from about 1968 ‘balling’ like ‘nailed’ having sexual implications.

            Now with sex and religion in the same paragraph my attention is fully engaged. Roll away the stone, its Good Friday, so pontification upon the state of Christianity may clear my slate on Jesus. This guy has wandered in my consciousness since I found a little red Bible at age three.

            After the ‘Pufferbelly’ song, Down by the Station,  the next song I learned in Baptist school at age 6 was “Onward Christian soldiers marching onto (or was it as if) to war.” I wondered then and wonder now, what Christians are doing marching to war, when the message was LOVE. When John Lennon said the Beatles were more popular than Jesus, he was right in my world, and when The Beatles sang “All you need is Love” there was no battle in mine or my friends world. 

Jesus was the first long hair I ever saw. There is some confusion in my brain with Jesus and Santa Claus. They came or celebrated the same day; both had a naughty and nice thing going on. Both could do magic with presents. One had disciples, the other reindeer and elves. New information says they both were married to very supportive wives who worked with their husbands. I think it’s a toss up economically, Jesus and the Catholic Church had a head start monetarily, but Santa and Christmas giving has the marketing momentum.

            It was in NLP classes that I grasped meta programs, magic pentagrams, and sorted behavior into frames that saw Jesus as metaphorical role model of present time, highest thought, divine connection, a creator of miracle with the faith to move mountains. He endured suffering, conscious suffering better than unconscious suffering. Pain happens, but misery is optional. He knew where and how to use his attention.

            So on Good Friday Jesus was nailed. Perhaps we are all metaphorically nailed into a dark cave of our own creation as spring ends, and given three days, for resurrection, celebration, and to put our attention on a  bouncy bunny bringing eggs, leading a parade of Easter Bonnets.

Namaste Gary