Attachment
The pope and I were changing clothes together in a locker room. Not sure why – maybe he wanted me to feel at ease in visiting the Vatican.
He asked a lot of questions about my background. I told him that in my religious tradition people were supposed to fast from regular food before receiving Holy Communion.
The pope expressed surprised at this practice but also said he understood.
“Only to man are some things more holy than others,” he told me. “In God this is not the case.”
After this, ranks of situations and concepts presented themselves for my review. Some of these would have been considered important or holy while the others just the reverse.
But suddenly I realized they were all equal – equally important, and equally unimportant.
And I realized the only thing that moved something from one camp to the other was a person’s attachment to it.
Aversion or desire made the seemingly unimportant become important.
A nice message in a well presented vision.
But why was the pope in it?
Maybe to underline the point:
the seemingly most important of men with the seemingly least so
. . . both putting on their pants one leg at a time.
Funny, as I was reading this, I kept hearing;
ReplyDelete"The Emperors' New Clothes" lol
I love how we are taught and shown things in our own seemingly whacky way, and we "Get it"
O sancta simplicitas!
I am very visual. I had a big smile seeing this story in my minds eye. Still laughing!
ReplyDelete"And I realized the only thing that moved something from one camp to another was a persons attachment to it. Aversion or desire made the seemingly unimportant become important."
ReplyDeleteIt reminds me of the experience of 'loving detachment' maybe too something like 'indifference' in regard to a situation.
I am sure that generates Peace within. I could use more of that these days. Another timely and true post.