Part One

Our transformation into heavenly beings is often thought of as involving the redirection of our emotional attitudes.  We will then love humility rather than power, find satisfaction in serving rather than being served, pleasure in divine companionship rather than worldly applause.  Our hunger will be after righteousness, God’s glory rather than our own.

And of course that’s true.  But the transformation will be still more profound.

A poet carefully studies the verse he’s been working on, then adds a comma.  He sits back, his poem completed.  He’s now content with what he’s done.

A man mopping a floor cleans the last corner, and then wrings his mop.  He stands back and surveys the room.  He’s now content with what he’s done.

What’s the difference in the contentment of the two men?  Is there a qualitative difference?  Perhaps an aesthetic difference?  The one result is art! we say.  The other’s merely a clean floor.   Yes, but between the experiences of contentment themselves, what’s the difference?  Not the difference between what they’re surveilling, but between the quality of the two experiences?

A woman tosses a ball out onto a lawn, then orders the dog crouched tensely at her side: Fetch! The dog springs away, then comes back carrying the ball, its tail wagging.  The woman pats the dog on the head and accepts the ball.

Another woman sitting on a lawn is feeling thirsty.  Please bring me an ice tea, she says to the maidservant standing nearby.  When the maid brings the drink, the woman accepts the glass and says, Thank you.

What’s the difference, from the two women’s points of view?  In both cases, an instruction or command has been obliged.   Is there some qualitative difference between the two, meaning a difference in the quality or nature of their satisfaction?

A concert pianist strikes the final chord of a Chopin prelude, and the audience in attendance stands and cheers.  A basketball player hits the winning basket from beyond the three point line, and the audience stands and cheers.  A war hero is introduced at a political convention, and the audience stands and cheers.

What’s the spiritual difference in the three cases?  And how do they differ from the first time her teacher congratulated the budding pianist, from the father cheering the toddler’s first basket in the driveway, from the soldier’s first victory over his playmates at hide-and-seek?

How does the fear of heights differ from the fear of snakes or the fear of failure or the fear of death?   How does loving a person differ from loving a movie?  Again, simply focused on the experienced fear, the experienced love, not their objects or circumstances?

Standing at a podium overlooking tens of thousands of enthralled soldiers in orderly ranks, a Hitler shouts calumny and fervid promises into a bank of microphones. 

Before a small congregation in a country church, I, an aged pastor, moisten the forehead of a baby while murmuring words of sacrament.

Strip away our eyes, ears, memories…everything except the spiritual sentience of our respective moments…and could you even distinguish between the two of us?

The appreciations of the gourmet and the gourmand are indistinguishable.  They differ in their objects, but not in their nature.  The menu of our emotional life, in whatever setting and however artfully flavored, offers very basic fare, common to rich and poor, to delicate and gross, to saints and sinners, common to all.