Dear Friends-
This morning I promised to send a written version of a powerful, long and dense quote I used in my sermon from the 20th Century English mystic, Austin Farrer. It is an expression of a spiritual path called the Via Negativa. As I shared in the sermon, I have been regularly pondering this quote over the last six months or so.
Here it is:
“When we pray, we must begin by conceiving God in full and vigorous images, but we must go on to acknowledge the inadequacy of them and to adhere nakedly to the imageless truth of God. The crucifixion of the images in which God is first shown to us is a necessity of prayer because it is a necessity of life. The promise of God’s dealing with us through grace can be set before us in nothing but images, for we have not yet experienced the reality.
“When we proceed to live the promises out, the images are crucified by the reality, slowly and progressively, never completely, and not always without pain: yet the reality is better than the images. Jesus Christ clothed himself in all the images of messianic promise, and in living them out, crucified them: but the crucified reality is better than the figures of prophecy.
“This is very God and life eternal, whereby the children of God are delivered from idols.”
If this intrigues you, I’m happy to explore this further with you. Yes, it’s a mystery!
Faithfully,
Christopher
415 456-4842
Photo Credit: BBC.co.UK – Painting of Austin Farrer, Warden (1960–1968) by George Speake