Rev.
Ann C. Fox
(508) 992-7081
UFairhaven@aol.com
Unitarian Universalist
Society of Fairhaven
Diamond Heart
a sermon by Rev. Ann C. Fox
August 26, 2007
Note: A reading is attached, which you might like to read first.
Are you on a spiritual journey? Are you a seeker after truth? A typical Unitarian Universalist may respond by saying, “Well, how might we define “spiritual” and how might we define “truth.” We like the path of inquiry? We are urged by our fourth principle to “affirm and promote a free and responsible search for truth and meaning.” So today, we embrace our fourth principle.
The world’s religions offer us scriptures and scriptural interpretations to answer our big questions. They essentially advise us to be good and have God or a spiritual practice to help us to be good. As we look out at the world’s human drama, we see that the effort to be good has not been very successful.
One of the simplest and wisest of world religion scriptures, the Tao Te Ching, tells us that if there is to be peace in the world, there must be peace in the heart. It suggests that the way to get that peace is to flow with the Tao (or the creative force). This is easier said than done. Perhaps we can achieve this in our meditations but can we flow with the Tao in our everyday life?
Many modern spiritual teachings say that our individual issues are what stand in our way of having a peaceful heart and mind and thus making our world better. They say that because of our issues or problems, we have become separated from our deep inner Self, which they spell with a capital “S.” They say that we become trapped in our small “s” self, our personality, with all of its problems. The solution, they say, is two-fold: 1) Get more in touch with our big S Self and 2) the big S Self will help us to work on our issues, but we must do the hard work of self understanding. (It sounds a bit like what AA recommends with turning to Higher Power for help, doesn’t it?)
Perhaps you are thinking that the big S Self is God, which is hardly a new idea. The important thing to understand is that big S Self is inside the human being, not an outside force. By the way, this big Self and little self is right out of the most ancient of Hindu teachings. What is new is the suggestion that we must work on our individual issues in order to progress spiritually.
The teaching called Diamond Heart combines the spiritual and psychological approach to human advancement. It is one of many similar teachings I have known but I was drawn to it recently because of its beautiful symbol of the Diamond Heart as a metaphor for human potential. The creator of this teaching (A.H. Almass) says that the potential of the human being is like a diamond—multi-faceted, strong, clear, precise, and sparkling.
I was also drawn to its word for big S Self, which is “Essence.” For me, the point of the spiritual journey is to invite Essence to be more and my issues or problems to be less. How do we invite Essence to be more? One way is to do meditation. So let us experiment a little now and practice Essence contact. (If you prefer to use the word Spirit or God or Consciousness, that is fine.)
Let us get comfortable by putting our feet on the floor with our spine straight, shoulders back but relaxed and begin to breathe deeply…..(Dear Reader, we did a two minute meditation to experience Essence, or “inner Self” contact…..) We can bring Essence into greater awareness in our lives by having a mantra like “Peace, peace, peace” and having a sense of our heart energy. (I would put my hand on my heart.) Or we might say a prayer, such as ‘Spirit, I would be more fully my Self.’
Essence has nothing to do with intelligence or great ability, although it can inform and enhance these gifts. You know you have encountered a person with a larger Essence awareness for the person will seem entirely authentic, open, and in the moment. You might encounter it in the ordinary woman at the coffee shop who looks right at you and only you and asks you what you want in a way that you know she’s not thinking of anything else other than to serve you. And you leave that place feeling something akin to, “That woman made my day!” You might be lucky enough to be treated by a doctor with high Essence awareness. One of you told me of how an Indian doctor always came to your friend’s bedside and did a "Namaste" (hands clasped together as if in prayer), it’s meaning being “the divine in me greets the divine in you.” He would have grown up doing this but how interesting that he’s brought this part of his culture into his medical practice. How healing, at least to those of us who know what ‘Namaste’ means!
The Diamond teachings tell us that when we are born, we are pure Essence. When parents hold their baby, the baby has the effect of evoking Essence in the parent. Have you ever held a baby and noticed that it will look in your eyes endlessly? If that child grows up in a loving family, it has a better chance of holding onto more of its sense of Essence. The more problems a family has, the child gradually absorbs the problems and becomes more and more distant from its inner Self, its Essence. You could say that we become alienated from our own true Self. Our spiritual job in life is to retrieve our own Essence contact and bring it more into our daily life.
The teachings say that the problems we absorb from the family are like holes that need filling so we go about life trying to fill in the holes. Some of us do it by indulging in addictions, such as alcohol, drugs, food, endless television or entertainment. We may also be addicted to serial romantic relationships. We may feel completed by the other person for a while because we are open to encountering Essence in the other person. Then, reality dawns and we begin to see the other person as he or she really is—a person with issues, similar or different from our own. Then we may want to get away from the relationship because the last thing the small “s” self wants is to confront its painful issues. However, there is hope. As time goes on, we feel compelled to become more whole; this is sometimes called the mid-life crisis but younger people may experience it, especially if their upbringing was a loving one.
This very morning on CNN there was an article about Amma, a woman from South India (Kerala) who goes around the world giving hugs. Many in India say that she is an incarnation of God but she makes no such claims. She hugs hundreds of people every day. Americans have given up their high paying career to join Amma’s organization in India to serve the poor. When Amma was a child, people in her village noticed how kind she was to everyone. The kind child grew up. In the CNN interview, she was asked why she gives hugs. She responded that she wants to bring “mother energy” to everyone because, she says, the world needs more of it. Why do you think people come to her? She is manifesting pure Essence.
In June of 1992, I had just completed a spiritual retreat in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Four hours before my flight was to take me back to my home in Southern California, someone brought word that Amma had arrived in a forest outside Santa Fe. A group of us decided to get a taxi to see her. It was a one hour trip. I could hardly believe the thousands of people waiting to see her. With only two hours now before my flight, I decided I needed to get back to my children. Just before I boarded the plane, a young man from the retreat came up to me beaming. “She took the people first who had flights to catch and she hugged me,” he said amazed.” I would like to have seen my own face! Opportunity lost!
While I believe much of the Diamond Heart teaching is valid, my own long ago experience as a secondary teacher is that very troubled children can come from loving homes just as well adjusted children can come from troubled homes. Nevertheless, the Diamond Heart teachings have a good understanding of the human condition over all.
They have trained teachers to guide groups of 15 students to confront their issues one by one and come to understand the root cause. They do spiritual practices such as meditation, artwork, solitary walking, and other activities that encourage being in the moment to encourage the expansion of Essence so that more of Essence fills in the “holes” left by issues that are resolved. They also do very intense activities to evoke difficult issues. One of my friends has joined such a group. I am interested to see how it all turns out.
In the reading this morning, Anne Lamott tells us that she thinks that she and Sam have Diamond Hearts, just like the one he gave her. Although Anne and Sam are mired in the struggle of parent and child (as many of us have been), in that “meatball” of their personalities is a shining, multi-faceted diamond heart. And perhaps we are like Anne and Sam, only with our own unique struggles.
I have revealed the major points of the Diamond Heart teaching to you in hopes that it will be useful to you. As a church community, we can be a sanctuary that nurtures the growth of Essence and therefore of human potential. We can be a support for one another as we are able to make mutual Essence contact, perhaps not all the time, but enough to make a difference.
May we contact Essence more and more often within ourselves and recognize it in others. And may our diamond hearts shine a light for our mutual benefit amongst us and in the world.
References
Almass, A.H. Diamond Heart: Book One, Boston: Shambhala, 1987. (Plus many online articles.)
Reading: from Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith
by Anne Lamott
I’ve never yelled at anyone in my whole life except for [my teen-age son, Sam,] and he yells at me, too. We fight about homework and his mouthiness and the laundry….I no longer wash his dirty clothes for him, because he will not put them away, so he does his own….
[One day, we were out for a morning walk.] Sam began chucking rocks into the creek….I listened to the splashes of the rocks he was pitching, aiming at other rocks, or at unseen enemies, creation and destruction in the same breath. I heard the knock of one stone hitting another, and fingered the diamond heart that I wear on a thin gold chain around my neck. He bought the heart for me last December, at the Mervyn’s holiday sale. A few days before Christmas, he thrust the box at me. I turned away from it, because I wanted to wait till Christmas, but he ripped the wrapping paper off, then opened the box for me. There was a small gold heart studded with diamonds, the exact piece of jewelry I had always wanted. He watched me with enormous pride and pleasure. “One hundred fifty-nine dollars at Mervyn’s, Mom,” he said, proudly, and added, “Retail!”
I asked a friend of mine who practices a spiritual path called Diamond Heart to explain the name, because I instinctively know that both Sam and I have, or are, diamond hearts. My friend said our hearts are like diamonds because they have the capacity to express divine light, which is love; we not only are portals for this love, but are made of it. She said we are made of light, our hearts faceted and shining, and I believe this, to a point: I disagree with her saying we are beings of light wrapped in bodies that merely seem dense and ponderous, yet actually are made of atoms and molecules, with infinite space and light between them. It must be easy for her to believe this, as she is thin, and does not have children. But I can meet her halfway: I think we are diamond hearts, wrapped in meatballs.
I would call my path Diamond Meatball: people would comfort and uplift one another by saying, “There’s a diamond in there somewhere.”
Still, on better days, I see us as light in containers, like those pierced tin lanterns that always rust, that let the candlelight shine out in beautiful snowflake patterns.
© The Rev. Ann C. Fox