From: Case (Case@iSpots.com)
Date: Mon Sep 05 2005 - 21:44:47 BST
[Anthony wrote}
You see, at best, I suspect that the average "customer" of Christianity is
given a different spiritual "product" from the more refined (i.e. mystical)
position that Christian theologians supposedly hold.
[Case offers:]
There are examples of recent attempts to deal with Christian mysticism. My
personal favorite is Stephen Mitchell's "Gospel According to Jesus".
Mitchell does a Jeffersonian edit of the New Testament and the result bring
Jesus' utterance into the main stream of mystical teachings. The most common
manifestation of Protestant mysticism occurs among what I like to refer to
as the "alter callers" that is any denomination that ends it's service with
a call to have parishioners come to the front of the church and receive
salvation. The more extreme alter callers employ mass hypnotic techniques to
bring their congregations into ecstatic states in which they speak in
unknown tongues, fall on the floor in traces or begin to laugh hysterically.
There are of course many examples of Christians flogging their mystics. Joan
of Arc, Valentinius and gnostics comes to mind.
Another thread here somewhere is going on about Pirig's brujo example which
in retrospect sounds a lot like Jesus' encounter with the Romans with a
slightly happier ending. Was it the happy ending that led Pirsig to select
the brujo example, I wonder?
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