Monday, January 5, 2009

ex nihilo


In the beginning, God created by speaking, and from nothing came the cosmos. Godlike, I write and this blog, my first, comes into being. Whether one uses a chisel to carve hieroglyphics into stone, an ink pen to write words onto paper, or a computer keyboard to organize electrons in cyberspace which appear on screens as characters recognizable as words, authors create a world of their own in and of words. Readers enter into that world and in a blog, through reflection and feedback, help shape and create that world.

"Summit to Shore" is a multi-valiant reference to two of my loves, mountaineering and sea kayaking, the fact that I grew up in the mountains of Appalachia but now live on Long Island, NY, and Jesus' ministry which encompassed the shore along Lake Galilee and the summit of Mount Tabor, not to mention the summit of Calvary. Summit to shore seems to cover the full geographical lay of the land, so to speak, as everything else falls between, beneath, or above.

Shores and summits are liminal places where elements meet and mix, where the veil between worlds and realities can often be very thin and one’s awareness of the divine can be heightened. At least that is how I have experienced such places.

My hope and prayer is that through this blog I might create a world in which to share my Philosophical and Theological thoughts, reflections, musing and opinions from a progressive perspective, and that readers might by chance, upon entering this world, catch a glimpse of something higher, deeper and more transcendent.