July/August 2004 (Vol. XVII, No. 7)

May you be blessed abundantly this summer season, dear friends! May you open your hearts to nurture your soul in silence each day; for WISDOM flows from the Heart of Divine Love to all who are receptive ... and the world is sorely in need of more Wisdom.

Oscar Romero The Violence of Love

What is my word, what is human wisdom
  but a noise that reaches the outer ear?
But from that ear to the heart lies a road
  that only God can travel.
Blessed are you who do not put your trust
  in the noise of your own words,
  even though they come wrapped in great
          human wisdom.


 

Edwina Gately

Little by little, from a deep level, the Spirit of Wisdom is showing herself.  Sophia dwells in the hearts of those who seek new dreams and hope for a more wholesome world: the Dorothy Days, the Martin Luther Kings, the Archbishop Romeros ... [there are so many  now!].  Sophia rejoices in the visionaries and the peace-makers.  She fills them.  In a world which is hungry, tired and seeking, God's presence is shown in Sophia through people who are to experience, in our insecure world, God's wholesome vision and dream for the human race, born of both the masculine and the feminine Holy Energies.

China Galland The Bond Between Women

There is a Wisdom that arises--sometimes gracefully, sometimes gently, sometimes awkwardly, sometimes fiercely, but it will arise to save us if we let it, and it rises from WITHIN us, like the force that drives green shoots to break the winter ground, it will arise and drive us into a great blossoming like a pear tree, into flowering, into fragrance, fruit and song ... in that part of ourselves that can never be defiled, defeated or destroyed, but that comes back to life, time and time again, that lives--always--that does not die.

Joseph Goldstein, Jack Kornfield Seeking the Heart of Wisdom

Wisdom replaces ignorance in our minds when we realize that happiness does not lie in the accumulation of more and more pleasant feelings, that gratifying craving does not bring us a feeling of wholeness or completion.  It simply leads to more craving and more aversion.  When we realize in our own experience that happiness comes not from reaching out but from letting go, not from seeking pleasurable experience but from opening up in the moment to what is true, this transformation of understanding then frees the energy of compassion within us.  Our minds are no longer bound up in pushing away pain or holding on to pleasure.  Compassion becomes  the natural response of an open heart.

thanks to Carolyn Nicosia

Wisdom is radiant and unfading, and she is easily discerned by those who love her, and is found by those who seek her.  She hastens to make herself known to those who desire her.  One who rises early to seek her will have no difficulty, for she will be found sitting at the gate.  She goes about seeking those worthy of her, and she graciously appears to them in their paths, and meets them in every thought.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Wisdom is a living stream, not an icon preserved in a museum.  Only when we find the spring of wisdom in our own life can it flow to future generations.

Helen Luke

Wisdom consists in doing the next thing you have to do, doing it with your whole heart and finding delight in doing it.  And the DELIGHT is the sense of the sacred.

Evelyn Underhill

Ignorance of spiritual laws is bondage; knowledge of spiritual laws is freedom; application of spiritual laws is wisdom.

Chinook Psalter II

In the pouring forth of wisdom
   all things have their being;
   wisdom in my shining,
   wisdom beyond me shining.
All things are branches
  of the Tree of wisdom
  wisdom in me growing,
  wisdom beyond me growing.
In the circle of being
  all things share a blessing;
  wisdom in me turning,
  wisdom beyond me turning. 

Jane Lead A Fountain of Gardens

There came upon me an overshadowing bright cloud, and in the midst of it a Figure of a Woman, most richly adorned with transparent gold, her hair  hanging down, and her face as terrible as crystal for brightness, but her countenance was sweet and mild.  At this sight I was somewhat amazed, but immediately a Voice came saying, "Behold, I am God's eternal Virgin, Wisdom, whom thou hast been enquiring after.  I am to unseal the Treasures of God's deep wisdom unto thee."

John Fox Poetic Medicine

Wisdom means "to see" or "to know".  It does not mean knowing facts or having an opinion.  Wisdom is uncovered by being present enough to perceive the essence of your whole experience.  This wisdom will help you attend to what matters in your life and understand the meaning of your life's changes.  The practice of moment-to-moment PRESENCE is key.  Seeing essence; knowing wholeness.

Wm. Meninger The Temple of the Lord

Wisdom  has no limitations and embraces the profound as well as the simple.  She can be found in the huts of the poor and in the palaces, in workshops and in lecture halls.  She deals with the most profound speculations on the creation of the world and the very nature of God and even with the inability of men and women to come up with adequate answers to these great mysteries.  Wisdom tells us to be attentive to her and to incline our ears to her understanding.

Frances Vaughan Frances Vaughn

Wisdom is developed through spiritual practice; for in silence you learn what can never be taught.

John Donohue Anam Cara

Wisdom is the art of balancing the known with the unknown, the suffering with the joy; it is a way of linking the whole of life together in a new and deeper unity ... Wisdom is the art of living in rhythm with your soul, your life, and the divine.

Oonagh Shanley-Toffolo The Voice of Silence

Innocence is precious and powerful: not to be confused with ignorance, it is a Divine protection against the negative forces of life.  We grow wise by stages and often a whole lifetime of experience is necessary to gain wisdom.  "Wisdom is glorious," said Solomon, "and never fadeth away."

Indian scripture

Pleasure is one thing; wisdom is another.  The first leads to sorrow, though pleasant at the time.  The latter, though at first unpleasant, leads to lasting joy.