Spared from Heaven

Inside, her heart flits and shifts

If we can keep her distracted

we'll surely have her.

Keep her focused on her errors,

her impulsive actions,

her vain impressions.

The anxieties of every day--

She'll surely leave no time to pray.

Let her chastise herself for feeling this

animal nature of her human-beingness.

Like a button she cannot press,

Keep her feeling distress

in her heart, in her dew-kissed sex.

Magnify the trial interwoven in the bliss

so that she forgets how to free herself.

Let her miss--

The mark, a path that's clear and narrow

Keep her drunk enough on self-loathing 

to cross her eyes. Fill her marrow 

with a longing for that which she can never reach.

Her soul craves answers no man can teach.

Wear her down just enough to tire her

So she lifts not the book to her eyes

Nor the Word to her heart.

Then we can safely take her home

Where He the enemy will never be 

united with her in eternity.

Feed her flesh, let her mind and fingers wander

down her sides, raking over hips and thighs.

All she has to do is believe she is not good,

Beyond redemption.

She'll be just another closed account:

Spared from Heaven.

This is My Heart's Last Song

This is My Heart's Last Song

Never cared much for earthly things

I've only ever craved

Unity with the uncreated

A divine union

To perhaps taste what is to come

Come into my heart

My Lord, My God

Let me feel

The ecstasy of your Divine Love

Through you 

With you

In you

Make love to my heart

My soul hungers

For another soul to know my own

So deeply inside

They inhabit my entire being

Their soul in mine and mine in theirs

What to do with this

fascination with a creature?

Is saying thank you enough?

An ache is awakened

that can't be satisfied

With my tongue

I taste the skin

where heaven and earth kiss

Never-ending desire for the infinite

I stay present in the ache

and offer it to you

Come, untwist me

Restore my cold and hardened heart

to one of warm flesh like yours

(Oh, this is what it feels like.)

Tears erupt from my wrenched heart again  

But I have Loved.

I have Loved here.

Help me heal the hearts

That walk upon the Earth

Help me create a new world

Through Love, With Love

And In Love

There is nothing else.

Sower of Heart-Seeds

Reflecting on today's gospel reading from Matthew 13:1-23, the parable about the sower and the seed, I kept thinking about the poem I wrote a couple weeks ago after hearing the words "We planted roses in the garden of Gethsemane" spoken to my heart in prayer. A different poem I wrote a few months ago included the line "Love makes blood into Roses", and it made me think of all of the parabolic possibilities. Christ shed his blood for us with so much love. The seeds of his love (blood) enrich the fertile soil of our hearts (depending on how fertile and receptive the soil of our hearts are) and we have the propensity to abundantly bloom with the seeds of his graces. The seeds are planted in our hearts (a whisper) and we can choose to accept these graces that are showered on us gratuitously. The roses grow from these seeds in our hearts and the roses are not only a symbol of what was to come (he literally "rose" from the dead"), but the petals are strong. Stronger than the flesh, which is weak. The roses can also symbolize ourselves, as we are the seeds he planted in his own heart. The "garden" of gethsemane is a garden that exists outside of time (although it was a real place), it is also a mystical spiritual garden that exists in the infinite and in our hearts. It can also be a metaphor for sexual union.

Plant your seed in my garden and watch the roses bloom inside my heart.

I Asked OVER 100,000 Women THIS QUESTION (Christopher West's video - TOB Institute)

The reason why no women raised their hand, and why I wouldn't either, is because we picked up on the key words "a man who can't control his...". I wouldn't want a man who can't control something, no matter what it is. It's not that we don't want a man with an insatiable appetite for making love to us. We want a man who harnesses the monster and CAN control himself or say "No". In that way, yes. That is true freedom. Knowing that you could give in to desires, but exercising that restraint and control. In my past, it has mostly been me who has the higher sex drive (to the point some men have felt emasculated and insufficient), but I want a man who definitely can control himself. Yes, I would surely want to know his "yes" means something. If he can't say no, he would take it from anywhere, not just me. And it would cease to mean anything special.

As Father Mike Schmitz talked about in one of his recent homilies, men should have “competent generosity”—The ability to harness their strength and power and put it at the service of others. (In this case sex drive). Women want that same competent generosity in the bedroom, too.

Eros or bodily shame?

“Eros is part of God’s very Heart: the Almighty awaits the ‘yes’ of his creatures as a young bridegroom that of his bride.”  -Pope Benedict XVI

After posting a photo of myself with the above quote, a Catholic male acquaintance of mine told me if I am turning men on, then it's not Catholic. This irked me. “Am I really responsible for how men react to seeing photos of me?”, I thought. Especially if the photos are not actually revealing anything and are intended to be artistic? How can a sculpture or painting of a woman's naked torso be art and yet a photo of mine is too tempting and therefore I should be ashamed? 

I do not want to feel ashamed, nor do I think God originally intended us to be ashamed by our bodies. Our bodies reveal the mystery of God's love. Eros isn't separate from Christianity, it's essential to it, and a symbol of how we ourselves enter into marital union with God with unimagined intimacy. I took the photo down because I don't want my intentions to be misconstrued, but I really feel that our bodies are a gift and show God's love. I'm not showing myself for men's lust, I'm unashamed and I want to share the Eros that God feels for us. 

However, not all who look “see”, and I should protect my body, not because the naked body is bad, but because it is so good. Because of man’s fallen nature, my body has the propensity to lose its sacred nature in being seen as a something instead of a someone. So, it’s not that it would be my fault for causing a man to sin, but I would be putting it out there, sadly, on display, to be used by those who do not see. Even if my intention is to be seen with the same Eros God has for us. Then the sacred would be profaned. My awareness of man’s propensity to twist the divine makes it my responsibility to keep my modesty and uphold my dignity by veiling my body. I understand now. 

It’s something I wrestle with since I enjoy the beauty of erotic art and literature. I also have spent most of my life overweight (plus, father wounds…yadda yadda), so when I take photos that are attractive physically, I want to show them and I’m proud of my work and discipline I’ve put into my body recomposition. I know not everyone gets to see too much, though. That is for Christ and the one who shares a marriage bed with me. 

This video of Christopher West answers my question, precisely.

Nakedness in Art and P*rnography (ft. Sister Wendy)

#tob #theologyofthebody #sacredart #pornography #nakedness #art #shame #dignity #christopherwest #jpii