Fear, the worst: Gerard Guiton’s Thought for the Week

‘To fear is to be other than our true selves.’

Fear can be a spiritual Pied Piper. It can mesmerise us, leading us away from Love, and from trusting each other. We see it at the international border and the military recruitment office, in the class system, and in the labelling of people as ‘strangers’ or ‘foreigners’ – as ‘them’.

Fear is a festering wound that feeds our little ego. It lies at the heart of our unpeaceful thoughts and actions. To fear is to be other than our true selves. 

We’re told there’s no fear in Love – that perfect Love casts out fear. And it’s true that the fearful cannot enjoy maturity in Presence, because fear eats away at faith, and stunts spiritual growth. Fear is paralysis and misery. Jesus saw how it corrodes our humanity, drains Love from our souls, and how it needs exorcising as quickly as possible.

‘Do we live in dark times? Yes and no.’

Jesus lived in times more fearful than ours, as did George Fox. And yet they knew that fear dissolves when, as we come together in trust, it encounters our compassionate attention. The Love that results binds us more to Spirit, and gifts us with space for a deeper faithfulness and wisdom. No wonder ‘Be not afraid’ and similar statements appear over 300 times in the Bible.

Do we live in dark times? Yes and no. The key is not to allow oppressors their comfort. We don’t have to be like them to forget how to transcend inwardly to the Messiah within. This Light is, as Catherine of Genoa said, our Me, our God. Eckhart von Hochheim said the same, and so, too, Rūmī, Al-’Arabī, Jakob Boehme, the Early Friends, William Blake, Rabīndranāth Tagore, Dorothy Day, Ramaṇa Maharṣi and millions around the world today. 

No: like always, this time is resplendent with love, colour, warmth, surprise, expectation, beauty and kindness. These and much more combine to give Light its day, the Light that shines with grounded hope, the sort found in Julian of Norwich’s assurance that ‘All shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well’. Such hope anticipates a eutopia, a practical and achievable vision of meaning, purpose and happiness for all. Julian wanted us to Light up the world by being Light, so that we could see with our hearts, celebrate life with gratitude, and nurture faith in, and persistence for, spreading The Way. This is the Gospel of Love with its green meadows of flowers and joyous laughter, not the cold grey trenches of tears and division. 

It’s a time for cheerfully (i.e. courageously) travelling the highways and byways of the earth, switching on the Light. It’s a time for people to know our Religious Society as an oasis of Love, a hope-filled community of insight, as a sanctum of Wholeness and Unity to which all are wholeheartedly welcome. It’s time to say with convincement, ‘We’re here: join us to work for peace, justice and compassion.’ There lies the future of humanity; there lies the future of Friends. 

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Comments

Thank you, Gerard Guiton. Merci beaucoup. I have come to believe that spiritual awakening requires coming to know the darkness inside of me and in creation, in addition to knowing the light, as have said many throughout the few centuries of recorded human history. I also believe that our power of choice between positive and negative, regardless of the circumstances Viktor Frankl said after his release from imprisonment, is a talent unlike anything else we know of in creation…so far! Our choices made in silent reflection are what we were created for, and Quaker Meeting for Worship is one of the tools I have access to that allow me that liberty. Daniel Clarke Flynn, Belgium, member of Westminster Meeting London.

By Daniel Flynn on 29th November 2024 - 7:49

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