Black Sun

I was going to write about costume and fashion(loads of Braudel quotes) but my attention was caught by something someone said about grace-and what use are the words of philosophers, historians, or theologians to me in this regard? What is the point of talking about grace from the outside?

There are levels of grace, a hierarchy of them. One says grace for the food one receives, one can recognize the grace of a dancer; in both it seems there is the sense of proportion, a recognition of balance. Equally, there is a sense of gift and reciprocity, one might even say etiquette: one has the good grace to accept or return a compliment. The gifted artist gives something of his gifts away and this leads to us being thankful for being brought into the circle of admirers

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However, on the other hand, is it not the case that grace is completely disproportionate to what we expect or can comprehend? So, whilst grace is the very ability to be thankful for what is not ours (Rumi would say free will is the capacity to be thankful for God's Beneficence) is it also not an awareness that our response will always be lacking?

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Two further points. I don't think one can ever reflect on grace without the notion of thankfulness. To 'truly bless', as Auden might say, is not such an easy thing. Many are stuck in 'la'. For the entirely self-made man nothing is 'given', all is possessed or coveted. Only an awareness of what is given to us -life itself-can lead to grace. Secondly, is grace the ability to not be weighed down by our own gravity? Grace is a 'descent' but by it being so it allows an ascent-and that too is a recognition of something beyond one's narrow horizons: lightness , in both senses of the word

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Perhaps we humans,

have wanted God most as a witness

to acts of choice made in solitude.

Acts of memory,

of sacrifice. Wanted

that great single eye to see us ,

steadfast as we flowed by.

Yet there are other acts

not even vanity,

or anxious hope to please, knows of-

bone doings, leaps of nerves, heart-

cries of communion: if there is bliss

it has been already

and will be; out -

reaching, utterly

Blind

to itself,

flooded

with otherness