#Order of the Crutched Friars

[streetsofdublin]

A VISIT TO THE PRIORY OF ST JOHN THE BAPTIST IN TRIM COUNTY MEATH

https://videos.files.wordpress.com/peYVDEU3/the-priory-of-st-john-the-baptist.mp4

THE DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS 2023 This Christmas I spent three days in Trim County Meath and it rained most of the time. On Wednesday the 27th it was so wet and stormy that it was impossible to take any photographs so I returned to Dublin ahead of schedule. As my Canon 5DIII performs very well in wet weather I decided to bring it with me instead of me rather than my Sony A7RIV or FX30. Another…

[beautifulpoetryfest]

St. Gertrude of Nivelles - icon: Jennifer Richard Morrow

Patron of cats    ( All the saints )

Gertrude is the patron saint of the City of Nivelles, The towns of Geertruidenberg, Breda, and Bergen-op-Zoom in North Brabant, also are under her patronage. Saint Gertrude was also the patron saint of the Order of the Holy Cross (Crosiers or Crutched Friars). In the Crosier Church in Maastricht, the Netherlands, a large mural from the 16th century depicts eight scenes from her life and legend.

The legend of Gertrude's vision of the ocean voyage led her to be as well the patron saint of travelers. In memory of this event, medieval travelers drank a so-called "Sinte Geerts Minne" or "Gertrudenminte" before setting out on their journey. Her attention to the care of her garden led her assistance to be invoked by gardeners, and also against rats and mental illness. She was also called the patroness of cats.

[fhithich]

Little Blakey Howe

The Crutched Friars arrival at Blakey Ridge in 1347 to set up a monastery.

A Bronze Age burial mound topped by an 18th century boundary stone which is inscribed with the initials ‘TD’, thought to refer to Thomas Duncombe, 18th century owner of the Duncombe Estate. It is thought the stone may be a prehistoric standing stone, in which case it would have been standing when the Crutched Friars of the Order of the Holy Cross arrived in 1347 to set up a oratory at Blakey…

[misspeak]

Collections: Protestant Episcopal Historical Society, 1853

Halifax the 11th August, 1782. Rev. Sir, I have for some time been in expectation of receiving your answer to my letter by Mr. Lovett on the subject of my child; but having been given to understand by him and other friends of yours that I may assure myself of your receiving my boy, I have at last determined to send him, and I have made choice of his going by water, as I cannot accompany him myself by land—a satisfaction I wished much to have enjoyed, and what I have had in view for a long while, but being now within a few days of leaving this for York in my way for England, will prevent me the pleasure of seeing you and that of delivering up my dear child into your care, which I now do, with all the endearing and tender feelings of a father, earnestly requesting you to receive him in that light. His aunt accompanies him in the desire or seeing him safe with you, and I shall leave directions with Mr. Thompson (one of his guardians) to pay you the charge of his yearly board and education: every other necessary will be sent to him by Miss Peak and other friends, whom you will be pleased to correspond with in my absence. I have sent a black servant of my own in order to assist you in the care of him. This man has been mine for the last 8 years, and I hope he will behave so as to become useful to you as well as the child, and I have laid my commands on him to obey you the same as myself, and not to do anything or move from your house without your leave. Whatever quarter my professional duty may Calle me will not prevent my corresponding with you, and I beg you will write often, and put your letters under cover to Alex. Thompson, Esq. at Halifax, and he will forward them to James Sykes, Esq. Crutched Friars, London, where they will be taken care of. The indulgence of a very tender mother and other friends over the boy I am fearful may occasion you and Mrs. Bailey more trouble before he forgets it than I wish he should, but I hope in times his natural disposition will appear, and so far as may be comprehended from his infant years I am in hopes he will not give more than what may be expected. The wind coming favorable this morning hurries me in hopes of the Vessels getting away. My respectful compliments wait on Mrs. Bailey, I present the same to you and any, Rev. Dear Sir, Your most obedient humble servant, H. Mowat.

[bornin1985-blog1]

A Conscious Universe

The scale of the universe is awesome. Our sun, which is more than a million times greater in volume than the earth, is, as everyone knows, only a tiny speck in the unimaginable vastness of the Milky Way. Hundreds of billions of such suns make up this galaxy, most of them far greater in size than our own. And the galaxy itself is but a tiny speck among countless billions of galaxies that occupy the cosmos that science perceives. Each sun is an ocean of energy, one tiny fraction of which is enough to animate the life of our earth and everything that exists upon it. Every second there pours forth from the Sun an amount of energy equal to four million tons of what we call matter. Since the planets of suns capture so little of this energy, all of outer space is in reality a plenum of force that is largely invisible to us, yet life giving. To set our minds reeling, it is enough to contemplate the bare distances that astronomy has measured. Light, traveling at 186,000 miles a second takes eight minutes to reach us from the sun–but four years from the nearest star, 27,000 years from the center of the Milky Way, and 800,000 years from the galaxy Andromeda. Yet Andromeda is now considered a member of what is called the local cluster of galaxies, beyond which lie countless stars and groupings of stars thousands of times more distant from us than Andromeda. As with size, energy and distance, so with the reaches of time. Astronomers say the earth is some five billion years old, which means that the entire history of mankind, as we record it, is but a fraction of a second in the time scale of earth. It is no exaggeration to say that in this picture of the universe man is crushed. within cosmic time he is less than the blinking of an eye. In size he is not even a speck. And his continued existence is solely at the mercy of such colossal dimensions of force that the most minor momentary change in these forces would be enough to obliterate instantly the very memory of human life. Ancient man’s scale of the universe is awesome, too, but in an entirely different way, and with entirely different consequences for the mind that contemplates it. Here man stands before a universe which exceeds him in quality as well as quantity. The spheres which encompass the earth in the cosmological schemes of antiquity and the Middle Ages represents levels of conscious energy and purpose which “surround” the earth much as the physiological function of an organ such as the heart “surrounds” or permeates each of the separate tissues which comprise it, or as the captain’s destination “encompasses” or “pervades” the life and activity of every crewman on his ship. In this understanding, the earth is inextricably enmeshed in a network of purposes, a ladder or hierarchy of intentions. To the ancient mind, this is the very meaning of the concept of organization and order. A cosmos–and, of course, the cosmos–is an organism, not in the sense of an unusually complicated industrial machine, but in the sense of a hierarchy of purposeful energies. Here it is important to note that even in terms of physical astronomy ancient man did not use the word “earth” in the way we do. In his astonished and astonishing book, Hamlet’s Mill, Giogio de Santillana explains how misled we have been to think that the wise men of old actually thought the plane earth was flat. Cosmic phenomena were described, and their laws were expressed in the language, or terminology, of myth, where each key word was at least as “dark” as the equations and convergent series by means of which our modern scientific grammar is built up… What was the “earth”? In the most general sense, the “earth” was the ideal plane laid through the ecliptic. The “dry earth,” in a more specific sense, was the ideal plane going through the celestial equator…the words “flat earth” do not correspond in any way to the fancies of the flat-earth fanatics who still infest the fringes of our society and who in the guise of a few preacher-friars made life miserable for Columbus…(Moreover), the name “true earth” (or of “the inhabited world”) did not in any way denote our physical geoid for the archaics. It apples to the band of the zodiac, two dozen degrees right and left of the ecliptic, to the tracks of the “true inhabitants” of this world, namely, the planets. We have misunderstood these cosmological schemes of the past. What we call “geocentrism” was never meant to establish the earth merely as the spatial center of the great universe, but principally to communicate its place as an intersection of primary and secondary cosmic purposes and forces. The medieval mystic Meister Eckhart likens the earth to a station of cosmic reality through which there passes all the powers of Creation on their way to complete unfolding. “Earth…lies open to every celestial emanation. All the work and waste of heaven is caught midway in the sink of earth." In the Hermetic writings the hierarchical structure of the cosmos resembles that of an organism: cell in the service of tissue; tissue in the service of organ; organ in the service of the whole (governed by a supreme consciousness or intelligence). At each level of being there are "gods” or “angels” or, to use less uncomfortable language, “purposeful energies.” From this point of view, the ancient spatial descriptions of the cosmos are meant to be understood symbolically. Likewise, the word “sphere,” used in describing the forces and purposes at different levels, is never meant merely to be taken literally. The very idea of the circularity of movement in “the heavens” can be understood to mean not only the encompassing nature of these progressively higher influences, but their eternal nature. The circle is, among many things, a symbol of that which “eternally recurs,” that which is not subject to time and change as we know them. Obviously, there is a great difference between contemplating a universe which exceeds me in size alone or in intricacy alone, and one which exceeds me in depth of purpose and intelligence. A universe of merely unimaginable size excludes man and crushes him. But a universe that is a manifestation of great consciousness and order places man, and therefore calls to him. So much is obvious, for a conscious universe is the only reality that can include human consciousness. And only when I am completely included by something does the need arise for me to understand my relationship to it in all the aspects of my inner and outer life. Only a conscious universe is relevant to the whole of human life. Undoubtedly, one contributing factor in our misunderstanding the cosmos of the ancient teachings is our habitual assumption that a conscious universe is somehow more comforting, a psychological crutch. Giorgio de Santillana also speaks to this in Hamlet’s mill: [MAN] is unable to fit himself into the concepts of today’s astrophysics short of schizophrenia. Modern man is facing the nonconceivable. Archaic man, however, kept a firm grip on the conceivable by framing within his cosmos an order of time and an eschatology that made sense to him and reserved a fate for his soul. Yet it was a prodigiously vast theory, with no concessions to merely human sentiments. It, too, dilated the mind beyond the bearable, although without destroying man’s role in the cosmos. It was a ruthless metaphysics. “Ruthless” not in the sense of hostile to human hope, as many scholars have concluded by applying modern presuppositions to the interpretation of these ancient texts which speak of Nature as replete with “demons” and “darkness.” The universe of the traditional teachings, such as Hinduism and Judaism, is “ruthless” in that it is ruthlessly responsive to what man demands of it and of himself. For whatever man expects from external reality reflects what he asks or fails to ask of himself. We must explore this thought further, for it can help us to see why the idea of a conscious universe appears to modern man as naive, as either a daydream or a nightmare. Science, as we know it, searches the universe for order and pattern. To pursue this search carefully, objectively, the scientist struggles to be free of his feelings, his inclinations to believe. He may follow hunches–what he calls “intuitions”–but in the final analysis he wishes for proofs that will compel the intellect, and only the intellect. The entire organization of modern science, the community of experimenters and researchers, the teaching of science in the schools, the training of specialists, is based on this ideal of proof that compels the mind. Looked at in this way, we may conclude that the practice of modern science is based on a demand for human fragmentation, the division between thought and feeling. Searching for an outer unity, the scientist demands of himself an inner disunity. Perhaps “demands” is not the right word. We should simply say that in his practice the scientist endorses the division and inner fragmentation from which all of us suffer in our daily lives. We now see why a conscious universe makes no sense to modern science. In the ancient teachings, higher mind or consciousness is never identified with thought associations, no matter how ingenious they may be. If these teachings speak of levels of reality higher than human thought, they are referring, among other things, to an order of intelligence that is inclusive of thought. Consciousness is another word for this power of active relationship or inclusion. Can the power to include ever be understood through a process of internal division and exclusion? Fascinated by the activity of thinking, and drawn to it to the extent of psychological lopsidedness, is it any wonder that we modern scientific men almost never directly experience in ourselves that quality of force which used to be called the Active Intellect, and which in the medieval cosmic scheme was symbolized by a great circle that included the entire created universe?

#Asenseofthecosmos