Beltane 2009

Flickr image by mikescottnz
This year’s Beltane celebration was an important one for me, as it marked the official, outward, community acknowledgement of the invitation of the Mabon, the divine child, into our lives. My wife and I have invited a new One into our family, and though we haven’t yet received an RSVP, we are both feeling deeply connected and ready to welcome this new incarnation into the world.

As my journey into Fatherhood begins, Beltane offers me a time to reflect and meditation especially on the Masculine aspects of this Rite. One of my first and most profound connections with Celtic tradition was with an image of Cernunnos, who is often called the Lord of the Hunt and God of Fertility. This image struck me deeply, as I felt that I was one whose wild and green masculinity had been suppressed for many years. The image of Cernunnos was an invitation to move beyond my own fears and lethargy, to move beyond the comfort I had found in city life, into a more active spirituality that was deeply rooted in Nature, the Wild, and the Green aspects of life on Earth.

This desire for more active spirituality coincided with my continued and growing involvement with Warrior Sage, which has provided me a strong community of men who continue to encourage, challenge and support me in being more authentic, offering more of my gifts to the world, and striving to express love and my highest truth in all my actions. In this way, I’ve found Warrior Sage and Druidry to be the perfect compliment for my spiritual practice. One giving me the practical tools and support structure to move beyond my fears and lethargy, and one offering the depth, connection, history, lore and beauty that I’ve been seeking to experience and to express through my life.

When I was nearing the end of my college days, I was introduced to the work of Matthew Fox, an Episcopal priest, theologian and author of numerous books on creation spirituality - a tradition of deep ecumenism and mystical spirituality drawing on the roots of the worlds many religions. I haven’t been keeping up with much of his work in more recent years, but I recently came across an excerpt from his newest book, The Hidden Spirituality of Men: Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine. This new book seems to squarely address these topics that I’ve been encountering over the past several years.

Here’s an excerpt from the full article, which can be found here: Ode Magazine

If the warrior is different from the soldier, there must be distinct ways by which the warrior develops his or her strength. If the warrior is the mystic in action, then let’s try the following four steps on for size. They derive from the mystical/prophetic or mystical/warrior journey in the creation spirituality tradition.

1. The Via Positiva. This is the way of celebrating life, of seeing the world with its beauty and goodness, its grace and generosity—and being open to seeing more. This is the way of reverence, respect and gratitude. It’s the way of original blessing, whereby we live out the truth that the universe and life itself, for all the struggle and pain they dispense, have birthed us as individuals and communities with what we need for happiness and for sharing joy.
2. The Via Negativa. The Via Negativa goes into the darkness, the wounds, the pain and silence and solitude of existence to find what we have to learn there. It’s a way of letting go and letting be, of emptying and being emptied, of moving beyond judgment and beyond control, and learning to breathe, to sit, to be still, to dwell in silence, to taste nothingness without flinching and, ultimately, to focus. It’s the way of grieving. Without grief we can’t move on to the next stage, one of giving birth. The ancient German theologian, Meister Eckhart von Hochheim, calls the process of letting go “eternal.” The warrior faces death and, because he or she has, loves life more passionately.
3. The Via Creativa. Having fallen in love with life often (Via Positiva) and having been emptied and learned to let go and let be numerous times (Via Negativa), the spiritual warrior is ready to give birth. Creativity is the weapon, the sword, of the spiritual warrior—who is mother as well as father, and who digs deep into a wellspring of wildness that provides the energy for new life, connections, images and moral imagination by which to change things in a deep, not superficial, way. The true warrior is a co-creator, a worker with Spirit, a worker for Spirit. The warrior’s hands are the hands of Spirit at work; the warrior’s mind is seized by Spirit precisely in the work of creativity. As 13th century Catholic philosopher and theologian St. Thomas Aquinas put it, “The same Spirit that hovered over the waters at the beginning of creation hovers over the mind of the artist at work.” Every warrior is an artist at work for the people that they might live.
4. The Via Transformativa. Claims to artistry and to creativity and to co-creation need to be tested. The Spirit requires discernment and evaluation. The primary test for claims of spirit work is that of justice and compassion. Does the work I’m doing pass the justice test? Does it fill gaps between haves and have-nots or make the chasm deeper? Does it contribute to healing and empowerment of the powerless or re-establish the privileges of the few at the expense of the many?