I watch a hawk soar through the morning sky and something falls into place within me. It is as if I travel through a wood long unvisited and recognize familiar trees grown taller with the passing time. I come upon a thought, an act, a place with the vague sense of having thought that, done that, been there before. Or I come to a fork in the road and I know by some unexplainable sense which is right for me. I walk and uncover or discover anew what I have always known. Living intimately with nature opens doors in my spirit; the mystery becomes known, darkness becomes light.
From the viewpoint of BELIEFS all doubts are disastrous. From the viewpoint of FAITH, doubt is the indispensable stimulant. To lose one's BELIEFS may not be a loss but a gain: an opportunity. "When the heart weeps for what it has lost, the spirit laughs for what it has gained," is an ancient Sufi saying. To lose one's FAITH, however, is catastrophic; the loss of this vital human constituent means mutilation, dehumanization, cynicism, nihilism.
~ from A LITTLE COMPENDIUM ON THAT WHICH MATTERS by Frederick Franck
"Peace is not the absence of war." Spinoza said it, but it is mindlessly quoted out of context, for he added, "It is a virtue, a state of mind, a disposition for benevolence, confidence, justice."
~ from A LITTLE COMPENDIUM ON THAT WHICH MATTERS by Frederick Franck
A paragraph from Frederick Franck's new book, A LITTLE COMPENDIUM ON THAT WHICH MATTERS, which he graciously sent to Friends of Silence, also speaks to this theme:
~ from A LITTLE COMPENDIUM ON THAT WHICH MATTERS by Frederick Franck
