With the Capitol, the Inauguration and Democracy in peril, an American president channeled his spiritual muse, reminding our present generation of the resilience of the American Soul.
A Secret Journey, A Capitol in Danger
On February 11, 1861, a tall but slightly stooped figure carrying the weight of the nation on his shoulders, boarded the train bound for Washington, D.C. Heading to the capital from Springfield, Illinois to be inaugurated as the nation’s 16th president, Abraham Lincoln is facing the starkest of realities: seven states have already seceded from the Union since his election in November. Four more are looking for a reason to do the same. Southerners believe a Lincoln presidency means the end of slavery and their way of life. Talk of civil war is rampant. Northerners rejoiced at the election’s outcome…
Maybe we need a little more The Jefferson Bible and a little less The Bible. Jefferson extracted Jesus' highest moral teachings ,kept those, and threw out the fantastical. Christianity became less about the sayings and wisdom of Jesus and more about the magic of the virgin birth, the resurrection and the cult of personality. Should we then be so surprised that the most zealous Christians turned to the cult of Trump , having turned their religion into the cult of Jesus?
Martin Luther King tapped into a mystical East-West lineage, one that can guide us in divisive times
It really boils down to this: all life is interrelated. We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied into a single garment of destiny… Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly… This is the way our universe is structured. We aren’t going to have peace on earth until we recognize this basic fact of the interrelated structure of all reality. -Martin Luther King, “A Christmas Sermon for Peace” ‘67
Martin Luther King’s words could have easily been influenced by an 18th century Deist. Or a 19th-century Transcendentalist. Perhaps by a 20th-century quantum physics scientist. …
When times call for Practical Mystics
It’s enough to overwhelm even the eternal optimist.
Impeachment. 2020 election. Australian wildfires, the climate crisis. Creeping authoritarianism at home and abroad. Historic polarization.
What’s an aspiring modern mystic-citizen to do?
The Transcendentalist movement of the 19th century gives insight into America’s DNA as a way in… and out. Along with the “expats” of the 1920’s and the Beat generation of the 1950’s, the Transcendentalists remain one of the nation’s most influential intellectual coteries in our history. They are the source of many ideas that we have come to define as “American.”[1]
Another American Revolution
Facing the polarizing specter of slavery and the…
Christopher Naughton
is an Emmy® Award winning producer/host of The American Law Journal, New World Radio, opines on history, the Constitution & spirituality christophernaughton.com
