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by Arthur Lucas Jones (Author)
"Seeing thoughts as text", to quote a creative poet, has been part of what is attempted here. The Child at Bethlehem who became the adult Jesus of Nazareth has never left us. He left no money or property. He left the Paraclete as his Voice and listener. We do not pray through a ceiling, we pray to "someone who calls out alongside us" and brings our prayers to the heart of God. I have been conversing with Jesus every day since I was a child. Prayer is both speaking and listening to God. The term used to describe this process and experience is The Utterly Profound Touch of Heaven. I call its practice Conversational Spirituality and I want to share it. It is based on our innate capacity to turn thoughts into speech and listen for the response and then turn our thoughts into texts for the guidance of life. That's how the New Testament was written. Welcome the Christ as we speak and listen to him through his bequeathed Voice in the world, the Paraclete. We speak, and we listen. That's how we talked to God so naturally as children. Let's recapture it! We are speech-making beings, and there is no point in speech without a listener to respond. The brand here is Christian, but it applies with great respect across the board to all faiths and wider spiritual searches. A scientist uses many lenses to see the universe and we use many lenses to 'see' God. Sometimes we stand-alone to do it, as with the boy and man in this book. My personal life has its unusual traits, for my profession, in that I have been married three times. That is not hidden here. A trail of sadness has followed me, as well as a trail of joy. Read on to follow the unusual aspects of my story ultimately as a Bishop of the Church. I pay tribute to those leaders of the Church who gave me permission via compassion to emerge with someone at my side who encouraged me to stay "fully alive" as a person of faith. That is a great gift of love and forgiveness. This story is set in very diverse backgrounds and cultures. The spirituality herein depends on the "still small voice of God" answering our speech when it is projected into the mystery of God. That is a clear test of faith in the "Numinous", the Divine Presence.
