"Ecce Homo", "Behold the Man"/ Pontius Pilot's "spirituality"

Ok. I've got to say it. What passes for "spirituality" today, including the New Age hysteria, and the grandiose big business enterprises, like Deepak Chopra's empire, all add up to narcistic sophistry.

It all began while looking for the text of "East Coker," ("Four Quartets.") I stumbled upon a website, ostensibly devoted to "spirituality." Succumbing to the temptation, I went a little deeper. Oh boy...quicksand...couldn't extricate myself from this syrupy tripe fast enough!

Chopra's website which markets $3000.00 seminars at exlusive resorts, (one such ad reads, "a safe haven of non-judgment,") like the Chopra Center in New York, named the "Dream Hotel," promises those, willing to fork over a few bucks, the way to inner harmony, peace, love...blah, blah, blah.

Millions, are forking over, caught up in the frenzy, sort of like the Obama supporters are caught up in his words, which say nothing. Testimonials abound! It's the same old, "can't we all just get along?" "Of course, we can," ply the nimble tongues of these trendy modern day prophets; "for a inconsequential price, peace is ours for the asking!"

Perhaps, from the back row of one's consciousness, a still small voice whispers, "uh, if I may, what is the "inconsequential price?" However, the frenzied crowd, like the congregation in Jeremiah Wright's Church, is loudly pulsing, rhythmically swaying, obcessed now only with the rising climax of voices, emotional excitement and mania. "Yes, yes, yes," as Meg Ryan's character emotes in the 1989 movie, When Harry Met Sally.

The answer...to that still small voice,

Truth, truth is the casualty.

But, "what is truth?" Pilot's words echo through the centuries. It is a poignant scene in the New Testament when Jesus is tempted in the wilderness. The Devil offers peace, there need be no emnity between us, all the kingdoms of the world can be yours, if you will just surrender that one little thing that separates us...if you will just bow down to me and surrender...truth.

These "new age" profiteers, including Deepak in his "The Third Jesus, the Christ We Cannot Ignore, " invite us, indeed, lure us, toward the same cynical question Pilot posed. "Can't we all just get along?" If you can just ditch this absolute "truth" thing, all will be well. Ignore, "I am the Son of God, ignore the ressurrection, ignore everyting that makes Jesus, God, we can all be God, so hearkens the voices in even an allegorical "Garden of Eden."

Jesus did not succumb to the temptation in the wilderness, even though it meant anything but peace, in this world. It meant a horrifying, tortuous death. Why?

Because, "I AM." Because, the Logos within each of us calls us to Him. Jesus is not a teacher, a sage, a philosopher, an "I'm ok, You're ok," historical figure. He is Truth, He is Personhood, He is Divine, He is Reality. He is Someone, not an idea or a philosophy.

Where does this leave us?

It leaves us with a choice. We deceive ourselves if we think we can ignore the ultimate question. Is Jesus the fully human, fully divine, Son of God? It cannot be dismissed, as Pilot tried to dismiss it, it must be confronted, existentially, by each of us. Our declaration for or against Him is proven by our acts, not our words. To act in the love of Agape is to declare for Christ.

I am not justifying here the pharisaical thinking within the institutional church, nor am I denying the wisdom and truth found in other religions. What I am saying is, if Jesus is absolute truth, as He clearly claimed, then wherever "truth" is found, it, by definition, has to be "of Him," so to speak, even if that fact is unacknowledged.

If Jesus is, as he said, "the Way, the Truth and the Life," then, "Being" is Christ. Contrary to what is so often "preached," his statement here, may be "exclusionary" only in the context of truth. It is simply a statement of fact. Truth is One. If, for example, a Buddhist, gives up his life, in love, for another, he is, by act, in Christ.

These are monumental claims, not made by any other historical figure, period. To deny the existential significance of that question, is fatal, and, it is nothing new...no, we can't just all get along, not if it means denying absolute Truth, not if it comes at the expense of a loss of man's dignity, liberty, his ultimate freedom to consummate, in love, a covenant between he and his Creator.

No, give me the "manly" love of Christ, not the impotence of modern day "navel gazers;" give me the love of Anne Frank, Maximilion Kolbe, Mother Teresa, Sir Thomas More, give me the love of Christian martyrs, eaten by lions, in the Roman coliseum.

Our "existential choice" comes in the context of this world, where evil is present, and must be battled, every single day, within our hearts and in the outside world, sometimes in the guise of a Hitler, sometimes in the guise of terrorists and sometimes in the guise of "peace."