The Light Within

I've been reading Thomas R. Kelly's book "Testament of Devotion" (1941). I've had to translate the antique language: The relentless torrent of God defined as "He, Him, Father, Lord, and King" is daunting and difficult, but when I labor to get underneath that, it's a sweet little book.

The first chapter is The Light Within: "Deep within us all there is an amazing inner sanctuary of the soul, a holy place, a Divine Center, a speaking Voice, to which we may continuously return." 

Kelly urges an internal practice and secret habits of the mind that allow you to be perpetually bowed in worship while going about your days, always reacting to the world joyously from this inward center.

Kelly says, "There is a way of ordering our mental life on more than one level at once." And we can create "fruitful interplay" between the two levels, carrying our questions and observations into the Light, re-seeing them in new ways. The best we might be able to do is to alternate between the Light and the World, but the goal is simultaneity - not forgetting - maintaining at least a dim and mild connection to the Light always.

We are directed to practice this opening to the Inner Sanctuary with humbleness because the steady sense of God's presence will only come as a gift. One way to begin is with repeated words (a mantra), which might evolve, with long practice and discipline, into an attitude that the words describe, of amazement, humble bowing, opening, Love, unity.

And be aware that achieving unceasing prayer is not the goal to be celebrated: Rather, that we become a conduit for the Creator. "Here the autonomy of the inner life becomes complete and we are joyfully prayed through, by a Seeking Life that flows through us into the world..." Not so much that I am praying, but that prayer is taking place in me.

This kind of inner prayer practice - maintaining a connection always with the Light Within - leads to a revision of our reaction to the world. "Worshipping in the light we become new creatures, making wholly new and astonishing responses to the entire outer setting of life." We receive instructions and illumination. We are both loosened from an attachment to the world, and also inspired to a divine concern for the world.

The paradox he talks about is the transformation from someone who is concerned with success and fulfillment to someone who is concerned only with love (my words). "Unless the willingness is present to be stripped of our last earthly dignity and hope, and yet still praise (God), we have no message ... nor have we yielded to the monitions of the Inner Instructor."

Chapter two is Holy Obedience, coming soon.