'Creation itself is now calling to us, sending us signs of balance, and the soul of the world, the anima mundi, which the ancients understood as the spiritual presence of the earth, is crying out.’ (Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Prayer of the Heart in Christian and Sufi Mysticism, p.71)
A culture which has ceased to realise the anima mundi, privatised the spiritual, encouraged the notion that any religion we devise is as good as others whilst scorning those practices and disciplines which the mystics have taught, will not restore what has been abused simply by addressing the external needs of nature. Instead of being slaves of consumerism we need to re-connect with the world's soul by acknowledging and tending our own, admitting (literally) that prayer is central to life as it connects us with our Divine Lover, and letting ourselves become a prayer: 'Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me (on the world)'.
It seems that our culture has become bored with the effort required to nurture the soul, telling us that ‘I’ and my superficial wants are central and can be gratified by other gods. Advertisers have persuaded us of the importance of satisfying our superficial desires and so the world appeals to the eye (and the ego-‘I’), feeds our appetite for pleasure, and offers apparent satisfaction by its appeal to our senses. Yet only when we dive deeper into the heart and realise the indwelling soul can we begin to address that lost inner world which connects all creation.
Try holding the earth in your heart – and if that is too much, your small part of it: the flower you see, grass on which you walk or tree against which you rest. Hold them before God, realising they are held in the heart of their Creator.
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