Balancing act

As I sit today and ponder things, there are several balancing acts that come to mind.  The first which shows itself is the balance between the spiritual and the religious,  a scale which I consider in the terms of our vertical relationship with the Divine and the horizontal relationship with each other.  It is all well and good for a person to have a strong vertical relationship, but without a healthy horizontal relationship it does little to help the Body of Christ (which is composed our brothers and sisters in Christ) or, in a more general sense, the Family of God (who are all of us).  Contra wise, if we focus entirely upon those around us in physical form, we lose invaluable insight into the nature of the Divine and fail to cultivate a truly vital and special relationship with the Divine.

Another balancing act is between the Heart and the Mind, what may be considered the art and the science of Religion.  Without an understanding of the Heart, the experiential and spiritual aspect of the religious, then the all the words of the Law and the Prophets are but dried ink on dead skins.  Without a grasp of the Mind, the academic and rational aspect of the religious, then our experiences are without context and are incommunicable to others.

Another balancing act which has presented itself recently is the question of Temperance vs. following one's heart.  Temperence lies in moderation and restraint.  And following one's heart lies in doing what is often unrestrained and immoderate.  It is, again, the tension between the logical, rational mind and the emotional, non-rational heart.  Too much of either causes you to burn with ardor or freeze with icy logic.  One could extend it further and say that it is a confluence of structure and creativity, of order and chaos.

All of these balances to maintain...so many wheels in motion....just like the world around us.