Posted by johnboy on August 31, 1999 at 12:03:44:
1) the *act of contrition*, says "i detest all my sins" because of a) thy just punishment and b) i have offended thee, My God
2) the *our father*, says a) forgive us and b) we forgive those
we have imperfect and perfect contrition and we have the *erotic* "what's in it for me?" and the *agapic* "what's in it for the other?" and we have Buber's "I - Thou"
in our formative spirituality, there does seem to be a natural growth process from the imperfect and the erotic toward the perfect and agapic, toward the
authentic "I - Thou"
at the same time, i resist the tendency to discard the "what's in it for me?" or the erotic or even the enlightened self-interest which has been poorly
described as "imperfect" contrition
on our spiritual journey, we don't discard 1) our desires, they are transformed; 2) our attachments, they become properly ordered; 3) our "self",
we transcend it
we have created false dichotomies and dualisms and end up missing the point entirely as evidenced by our widespread misunderstanding of ascetical
theology and this is no small wonder in a church which has, historically, in its seminaries, emphasized moral theology at the expense of mystical theology
for instance, the often severe asceticism of the little man from Assisi, of Juan De La Cruz or of other saints or mendicants gets misinterpreted as a
masochistic, vale of tears mentality, an outlook which fosters the erroneous notions whereby we eradicate desire, rid ourselves of attachments and
ultimately seek to eliminate *self* entirely --- fact is, these folks were heads over heels in love! and being silly and un-self-conscious comes with
the territory
when love reaches its perfection, the agony and pain can quite literally dissolve into joy and ecstasy, self oblation is not then a conscious sacrifice but an unconscious by-product---the problem is, we read the
hagiographic literature or observe our modern day saints and put the ascetical horse before the mystical cart or the *obligational onus* before the *aspirational opus* --- you can not tell the difference between a face, twisted and contorted in orgasmic ecstasy and a visage similarly groaning in
acute, pronounced pain--- an anological imagination finds a lesson there
in the unitive life, there is no tension between the agapic and erotic, the I and Thou
in the unitive life, desire and yearning and longing are purified and old attachments become new sacramentals
in the unitive life, we don't see our obligations, blinded as we are by our aspirations, our left hands of love not seeing our right hands of duty
in the Ignatian movement wherein we "see ourselves as God sees us", our proper notions of God spontaneously yield our proper notions of self which further yield proper notions of other and we are moved to repentance out of love and to a "contemplation to attain love"
in all of this, we don't create solidarity or the unitive, we discover it
once awakening to our solidarity, compassion ensues
and thus, for the mystic, putting others before the self is not problematical at all for there are no false dichotomies --- just like with the Trinity, there
is always going to be God, self and other--- thus, that five-fingered prayer will mirror, perfectly, that part of the liturgy wherein we offer ourpetitions
for the new catechumen, advocating putting others before the self could be very problematical, leading to false asceticism, justifying oppression, placing
the obligational always before the aspirational