GRGR (2) "great bright hand"

[Doug Millison]

At 3:05 PM -0400 6/7/99, Paul Mackin wrote, re my question (and Terrance's
answer) about how substantial Daoism is in GR compared to Christianity:
>Also it's easier to follow, isn't it?

Christian theology can be mind-bogglingly complex, even the "extreme
Calvinistic or Puritan version"  that Paul refers to -- the dynamics of
predestination and free will that lie behind any discussion of "elect" and
"preterite", for example. The mysteries of the triune God that is
simultaneously one and three (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) is also no
cakewalk. And when you get into the very deep waters of Christian mysticism
you arrive at reportage and system-building that is very close to mystical
traditions in Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam. A good starting point would be
Thomas Merton's _New Seeds of Contemplation_. Here's a sample with Daoist
(not to mention modern physics) reverberations:

"If, then, we want to seek some way of being holy, we must first of all
renouce our own way and our own wisdom. We must 'empty ourselves' as He
did. We must 'deny ourselves' and in some sense make ourselves 'nothing' in
order that we may live not so much in ourselves as in Him. We must live by
a power and a light that seem not to be there. We must live by the strength
of an apparent emptiness that is always truly empty and yet never fails to
support us at every moment. This is holiness. None of this can be achieved
by any effort of my own, by any striving of my own, by any competition with
other men. It means leaving all the ways that men can follow or understand."

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