NO shit...I'd give my right tit (well almost) for a Doolittle original like this one among many.
She paints with mystical charm...about areas of interest I entertain. When I sit on knoll in the Mill Creek Gorge I can feel the supernatural animals all around me. It is far better than any of the drugs or cannabis from the 1960's...the feelings are real.
For those disinclined To trek through the forest, So is this comment From the proffered link
The Perfume
We have a sign which marks the beginning of the restoration of unity in the entire fallen creation. This is the sojourn of Christ in the desert: "He was with the wild beasts, and the angels served Him" (Mk 1:13). The heavenly and earthly creatures destined to become the new creation in the God-Man Jesus Christ are assembled around Him. There is a pointed reference to this restoration in the life of St Isaac of Syria. He wrote that:
The humble man approaches wild animals, and the moment they catch sight of him their ferocity is tamed. They come up and cling to him as their Master, wagging their tails and licking his hands and feet. They scent as coming from him the same fragrance that came from Adam before the transgression, the time when they were gathered together before him and he gave them names in Paradise. This scent was taken away from us, but Christ has renewed it and given it back to us at his coming. It is this which has sweetened the fragrance of humanity.
In other words, the state of likeness to God in Christ to which he had risen enabled him to be with the wild beasts just as Adam was in his naming of them.
This may be the reason why pets are so important to humans. It is a sign of the new creation, of the restoration of kinship between two different parts of creation. With one or two (or more!) animals in the household, it is an icon of both Paradise and of the kingdom of God as each of us are called to name our animals as Adam did, and live in communion with them without fear. This is a way in which it can be said that our pets smell in us the fragrance, or, one might say, the perfume, of Adam before the fall.
To paraphrase Isaiah, when the human can lie down with the cat, or the dog, or the guinea pig, or, God help us, the snake, we aid the advancement of the Kingdom just a little, work to recreate Paradise just a little, and so give new meaning to such menial tasks as cleaning out the litter box.
Robert Flanagan, head librarian at the Camden County Library, Voorhees, NJ, is a member of the Orthodox Church of the Holy Cross, Medford, NJ.
From Jacob's Well Newspaper of the Diocese of New York and New Jersey
8 comments:
That was fun.
How Not to Be Seen.
This was my all-time fave: http://althouse.blogspot.com/2012/11/when-god-dog-zeus-fetches-its-cosmic.html
Too bad. Something along the lines of Bev Doolittle was in order, but...
TILT!
Predator!
NO shit...I'd give my right tit (well almost) for a Doolittle original like this one among many.
She paints with mystical charm...about areas of interest I entertain. When I sit on knoll in the Mill Creek Gorge I can feel the supernatural animals all around me. It is far better than any of the drugs or cannabis from the 1960's...the feelings are real.
That was fun.
That still is fun.
That movement is fun.
This is fun.
For those disinclined
To trek through the forest,
So is this comment
From the proffered link
The Perfume
We have a sign which marks the beginning of the restoration of unity in the entire fallen creation. This is the sojourn of Christ in the desert: "He was with the wild beasts, and the angels served Him" (Mk 1:13). The heavenly and earthly creatures destined to become the new creation in the God-Man Jesus Christ are assembled around Him. There is a pointed reference to this restoration in the life of St Isaac of Syria. He wrote that:
The humble man approaches wild animals, and the moment they catch sight of him their ferocity is tamed. They come up and cling to him as their Master, wagging their tails and licking his hands and feet. They scent as coming from him the same fragrance that came from Adam before the transgression, the time when they were gathered together before him and he gave them names in Paradise. This scent was taken away from us, but Christ has renewed it and given it back to us at his coming. It is this which has sweetened the fragrance of humanity.
In other words, the state of likeness to God in Christ to which he had risen enabled him to be with the wild beasts just as Adam was in his naming of them.
This may be the reason why pets are so important to humans. It is a sign of the new creation, of the restoration of kinship between two different parts of creation. With one or two (or more!) animals in the household, it is an icon of both Paradise and of the kingdom of God as each of us are called to name our animals as Adam did, and live in communion with them without fear. This is a way in which it can be said that our pets smell in us the fragrance, or, one might say, the perfume, of Adam before the fall.
To paraphrase Isaiah, when the human can lie down with the cat, or the dog, or the guinea pig, or, God help us, the snake, we aid the advancement of the Kingdom just a little, work to recreate Paradise just a little, and so give new meaning to such menial tasks as cleaning out the litter box.
Robert Flanagan, head librarian at the Camden County Library, Voorhees, NJ, is a member of the Orthodox Church of the Holy Cross, Medford, NJ.
From Jacob's Well
Newspaper of the Diocese of New York and New Jersey
Off to clean the litterbox!
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