“Now, you may be an atheist, an agnostic, a Christian, a Jew, a Muslim, a Buddhist, or something else…You may find the whole idea of God ridiculous, but I ask you to believe in the concept of a soul. You may just be chatting with someone about the weather, but I ask you to assume that the person in front of you contains some piece of themselves that has no weight, size, color, or shape yet gives them infinite value and dignity. If you consider that each person has a soul, you will be aware that each person has some transcendent spark inside them. You will be aware that at the deepest level we are all equals.”
Literary legend G. K. Chesterton once opined that “All men matter. You matter, I matter. It’s the hardest thing in theology to believe.” Author and columnist David Brooks would say that we all matter and are equal because we have a soul, that our humanity is somehow conjoined with divinity, that biology and theology are inseparable. This is the kind of thinking that could, if spoken, get one tarred and feathered in many religious gatherings, but it is the essential insight of mysticism in all religious/spiritual traditions – we are not God, but we are not other than God either.
What makes it so difficult to see the “transcendent spark” not only in others but in ourselves? Why is it that we often tend to miss the Mystery embodied in our bodies? How is it possible to overlook what is so essential to our being and that makes us all one? The answer to these questions may differ for each of us, but for me it has to do with having bought into the importance of appearance and the need to feel unique. When I judge myself and others by the standard of glamour, I fail to see the lasting beauty that lies beneath my skin and yours. When I’m focused on how I differ from you, I become oblivious to the common spiritual denominator we share.
But any response to the queries just posed notwithstanding, believing in the concept of something that has “no weight, size, color, or shape” is a leap of faith, a saying “yes” with our whole heart, a willingness to yield to a dimension of life that is beyond comprehension. It is the decision to take such a leap that enables us to not only see and feel the transcendent spark embodied in each of us, but to live lives ignited by it.
Attuned to Soul 