Metaphysical science, naturalism, modern science, contemplative medicine, and being a healer, by Dr. John Hughes, DO

1. The Metaphysical Nature of
Science, Medicine, and You
John Hughes, D.O.
Master of Theological Studies
Midwestern University
April 18, 2005

2. Where Are We Going Today?
 “The shaman of tribal peoples of northern Asia and
the Americas is the doctor of bodies, souls, and
situations. He has learned to be a personal mediator
between the everyday world and the ‘other world,’
leaving his body to commune with the spirits and
learn the specific causes of illness…”
--Andrew Weil, Health and Healing

3. The Metaphysical Nature of
Science, Medicine, and You
 Introduction
 What is Metaphysical? How is science
metaphysical?
 What is Science?
 Naturalism?
 Rise of Modern Science
 What is Contemplative Medicine?
 Who are You as a Healer?

4. Introduction: Dialogue Time
 “A scientist who writes poetry!” exclaimed the college
girl (now wife) I was attempting to swoon by thoughtful
prose. Yeah, I guess I’m a little outside the box in
comparison to most modern scientists but maybe for
good reason or at least, good passion. My
undergraduate years entailed traversing the mountains
of the Carolinas by foot, kayak, and bicycle,
interspersed with a few necessary tests about some
kind chemistry and biology I really do not understand
very well anymore.

5.  With beautiful collegiate girls, amazing fall and springtime
colors, pleasant weather, mountain waterfalls, I possessed
a heart ready to experience the world—who wouldn’t be
poet in such a landscape! Sure, I was a scientist—even
one who traveled the country proving (to someone out
there) that I could create some novel heavy metal
chelation compounds or destroy toxic industrial chemicals
using spent rocket fuel—but I was also human full of
passionate ambitions, youthful energy, and a mind to
somehow explore and describe the adventures of life.

6.  “Dude, CALM DOWN! This is a scientific paper; not some
journal sharing time about your life experiences and how
you contemplated some salamander who caught you
peering at him under a rock in a cold stream on a warm
sunny day with the most beautiful girl in the world by your
side. If you insist on discussing salamanders, talk about
the “science” behind them: how they mate, how the stripes
on the males converge, how they grow body parts back,
what the hellbender salamander looks like, and why they
require constant moisture.”

7.  “Sure, I like all that physical data, especially the mating,
and the naturalist activities that go along with obtaining
such information, but do not salamanders and maybe
even humans have more important qualities than those
determined by modern science? If “science” really
involves a holistic pursuit to discover and know all that
makes up life, why should I quell my passions or
contemplative thoughts about the salamander under the
rock or the mountain mist that sprays our shivering legs as
we stand at the base of a majestic waterfall? Perhaps
modern science, with all its claim to intellectual
predominance, just has little desire for my poetry, my
passions, my musings, or even “me” or “you” beyond an
identity as objects to be studied in a maybe a limited
fashion.”

8.  “So,” comes the emotionless reply from those who
question the idea that modern science understands the
world in a limited fashion. “Who really needs poetry
anyhow? How does some passionate contemplation
about life promote the progress of society that a
benevolent use of modern science does?”

9. Introduction: Dialogue Time
 A Dialogue with Science
 Passion, Beauty, Poetry: In Scientific Papers?
 What is the classical understanding of natural
philosophy (aka “premodern science”)?
 What is Modern Scientific reasoning? Based upon
what kind of information?
 What does it mean to reason?
 Is Modern Biology really the study of all Life? If so,
how does one “know” the Unseen Life?

10. Introduction: Identity Quest(ions)?
 A Crisis of Identity: The Opportunity to Be
More Alive, More Whole, More Healthy
 In Crisis: The Art of Medicine- If the basis of Science
goes beyond the so-called “natural” world, how does
the entire entity of medicine operate? In other words, is
the idea of evidence-based (based on “seen” evidence)
really true to the ancient art of medicine?
 In Crisis: Your identity as ontologically “human”: Is this
identity perhaps more powerful than the title “physician”
or “patient”?

11. Introduction: Identity Quest
 Ultimately the quest for identity is a quest for sense
 Our “sense” of reality (including our understanding of
science, medicine, and whoever “we” are) stems
largely from core philosophical and metaphysical
patterns
 These metaphysical patterns, usually only
unconsciously acknowledged, inform our sense of
reality go far beyond what we call our “own” minds.
 Hence, an exploration into the identity of “science,”
“medicine,” and “us” necessary includes some of
understanding of metaphysics

12. Metaphysical and Metaphysics
 Metaphysical: beyond the physical,
incorporeal, or supernatural
 Metaphysics: philosophy of first principles,
including ontology and cosmology, and is
more intimately connected with epistemology.

13. Metaphysics: Ontology and Epistemology
 Ontology: the nature of being
 Epistemology: how we know what we know
 Cosmology: philosophy dealing with origin and
general structure of the universe

14. Metaphysics: Ontology and Epistemology
 We all hold particular ontological (the study of being)
and epistemological (how one knows “being” and all
reality) perspectives
 These perspectives frame how we perform
(actualize) and conceive (potentiate) science,
medicine, and ourselves
 Bringing these perspectives to the forefront is the
purpose of metaphysical dialogue

15. The Metaphysical Nature of Science
 For Aristotle, the most exact science deals with 1st
principles (nature of being) and ultimate ends
 Aristotle’s “ultimate science” has as its primary
concern knowledge and awareness
 On the contrary, for Aristotle, “ancillary science” deals
with the utilitarian and productive aspects of the
universe and is thus less authoritative
 The pursuit of “ulitmate science” begins with
wonderment (of the stars, moon, origin of life,
cosmology) which inspires one to acquire knowledge

16. The Metaphysical Nature of Science
 For Aristotle (along with other ancients like Plato), “reason”
(especially scientific reason), is consistent with the order of
cosmology
 That is, the cosmos has a particular, normative order--an
order in which the moon travels around the earth, an order
of how plants grow and develop, and even an order about
how humans act

17. The Metaphysical Nature of Science
 Humans can understand, connect with, and participate in
the cosmic order through “reasoning” thus become more
aware
 In fact, for Aristotle the very purpose of “scientific
reasoning” is greater synchronization with and awareness
of the cosmic order
 The methodology of Aristotle’s premodern scientific
reasoning includes what we know through deductive or
inductive reason, contemplation, feeling, intuition, and
higher ways of awareness (eg. revelation)

18. The Metaphysical Nature of Science
 This science, and its methodology, stretches as far the
imagination can go because all arenas of cosmic order of
being (the aspects of life, death, life beyond death, all the
universe, heaven, earth, etc.) are open to exploration
 The end of such scientific pursuit is the “general good of the
whole of Nature”
 Such science even facilitates knowledge of the highest
orders of Being
 In fact, the most honorable science, for Aristotle, is the divine
science

19. The Metaphysical Nature of Science
 Divine science is that which deals with divine objects and
the first principles from God
 In short, the metaphysical essence of this supreme
science exists in the realm of the supernatural and might
also be known to Aristotle as “Theology” or “Wisdom”
 The methodology of supreme science is contemplation
 The “good life” for Aristotle and other ancients is one of
continual contemplation

21. What is Science:
E.O. Wilson and Consilience?
 Wielding a freshly exhumed 19th-century neologism,
E.O. Wilson sets forth his 1998 work, Consilience, to
show that human learning should be more unified.
“This new unity will come about when the scientific
method supplants the dominant modes of inquiry of
those disciplines which it has not yet conquered.”
--MCAT Lesson Book, 2001

22. What is Science:
E.O. Wilson and Consilience?
 Ultimately, Wilson wants to "prove the applicability of
the scientific method outside the natural sciences.”
 What is Wilson really saying? Is he on the same
parallel about “science” as Aristotle? What does he
want to conquer?
 In other words, if really comprehended and practiced,
where does Wilson’s claim take us?

23. What is Science:
Naturalism?
 Naturalism: The belief that the only valid epistemology for
humanity’s understanding of the entire universe is modern
scientific inquiry
 For naturalists, modern scientific inquiry means the
acquisition of knowledge that can be discovered only by
the five senses (taste, touch, sight, sound, and physical
feeling) through the scientific method.
 All other epistemologies--belief, faith, intuitive feeling-(i.e.
love, care), contemplation, even reason apart from the
senses) have no place in the universe of the naturalist

24. What is Science: Naturalism?
 The Society of Natural Science is an example of
contemporary naturalism which describes fundamental
characteristic of its truly scientific religion.
 Their mission statement: “The foundation stone of this
[scientific] religion—and the only aspect of it that we must
take on faith—is that the primary means of understanding
human nature and the universe is through science. Thus,
the scientific method governs.”
 Note the epistemological challenge of this Society’s claim:
They possess“faith” only in the autonomy of the “scientific
method” (which is, by their understanding is antithetical to
“faith”)

25. What is Science: The Scientific Method?
 The scientific method? What is this?
 We all know it:
 Observe (through the physical senses) a
phenomenon (I see blue color up in the air)
 Offer a hypothesis (The sky is blue during the day)
 Make predictions (The sky will be blue tomorrow in
the day)
 Test the prediction with an experiment (Go outside
tomorrow and look up)
 Repeat last 2 steps until predictions and
experimental findings produce a theory

26. What is Science: The Scientific Method?
 Why is the scientific method such a big deal today?
 Why is it so important to those participating in the
Western framework of medicine?

28. The Rise of Modern Science
The rise of modern science in the seventeenth
century ‘outshines everything since the rise of
Christianity and reduces the Renaissance and
the Reformation to the ranks of mere episodes,
mere internal displacements…the theologians of
the period… ‘replaced the inquiry of the
question by the pedagogy of the thesis.’
--Nicholas Lash

29. The Rise of Modern Science: Thesis
 Lash explains the incredible impact of the 17th
century rise of modern science, a science
characterized by an emphasis on an epistemology
based in the scientific hypothesis
 Modern science affected the entire world because it
challenged the epistemology of the previous era,
based largely upon the authority of the government-
church and other societal hierarchies

30. The Rise of Modern Science: Enlightenment
 This 17-18th century time period (1688-1789) is known
historically as the Enlightenment and was spurred on by
Bacon, Newton, Locke, Descartes, Diderot, Voltare, and
various other philosophers
 The Enlightenment enabled many to find liberation,
especially in France, from what they saw as constrictive
control of the government, church, and classical
philosophy
 While rejecting the government-church, these liberated
now individuals came to bow to Reason

31. The Rise of Modern Science: Baconian
Science and Cartesian Reason
 Baconian science (based solely on the scientific
method) and Descartes’ Reason ruled
 (Note: Because of their wedded nature in the 1800s, the terms
“science” and “reason” will be used interchangeably in this
presentation)
 These philosophers embraced “reason” as supreme
with the physical world being a place to assert reason’s
dominance (through a scientific method type of
epistemology)

32. The Rise of Modern Science:
Reason and Nature
 Reason was the agent given to all humans equally by
which universal truths could be discovered which would
enable humanity to agree (as to avoid wars, etc.)
 Nature was understood as only the physical universe by
which humans could use reason to put physical matter to
use for human benefit (rather than to attune themselves
to, as with Aristotle)
 For the modern philosophers, there was no inherent
reason in Nature for humans to attune themselves
 Instead, Reason derived from within an entity called the
“individual” rather that from the cosmos (as with Aristotle)

33. The Rise of Modern Science:
Rational Control
 The individual, now liberated from the cosmological and
other “external” orders, could now use Reason to
develop his own order over nature.
 In short, Reason came to equal “rational control over
Nature” by the individual (an entity now separate from
Nature)
 For these individuals, human nature, especially the
moral and religious components of it, is no longer
subject to any order except personal choices (because
human nature is not considered part of Nature)

34. The Rise of Modern Science:
Nature or Soul?
 For the modern philosophers, Nature, because it only
consists of only physical matter, does not include any kind
of metaphysical realities
 Hence, the Baconian science does not understand
anything beyond the physical as its object of study
 Thus, the body and the spirit (and soul) are separate along
with the body and the earth (This is known as Cartesian
Dualism)
 Under the Baconian science, the soul’s place in reality
dwells only in the after life while the body is a object, like
the rest of nature, to be poked, prodded, controlled, and

35. The Rise of Modern Science:
Theology in Bed with Baconian Science
 “Theology,” instead of, as Lash points out, being a
continual “question” (aka wonderment) about the
mysteries of God now is a partner of the Baconian
science
 Theologians pursued an exacting “apologetics”, the use
of the physical world to prove the existence of God.
 (Descartes’ writings, lab journals are full of proofs for
the existence of God).
 Theology became an analytic practice rather than an
contemplative one

36. The Rise of Modern Science:
Theology in Bed with Baconian Science
 Modern Theology, now as an analytic practice utilizing
Nature as its object came to serve, just like the
Baconian Science, the ends (most often utility or
comfort) of the analyzer, the human individual (a being
now deemed separate from Nature)
 Contemplative questions about Nature and her
inherent cosmological and theological ends came to
exist as an aberration from the productive purpose of
modern science and theology

37. The Rise of Modern Science: The
Baconian/Puritan Religion
 Taylor explains that “The Baconian Revolution shifted
the central goal of science [also theology] from
contemplation to productive efficacy.”
 Productivitiy for the betterment of humanity was
particularly the goal of science and theology
 This end of science is quite different that the “general good of
the whole of nature”
 Faith became simply a way for the soul to survive the
after life, which Baconian science had no tools to
quantify; otherwise religion’s ends and methodologies
ran parallel with those of Baconian science

38. The Rise of Modern Science: The Baconian
and Puritan Epistemology
 Taylor writes, there is “a profound analogy between
proponents of Baconian science and Puritan theology”
 Both promoted reality as living experience which acted for
benefit and use of humankind
 “Individual, experiential commitment” for the Puritans
 “Sensory observation” for the Baconians
 The Baconians and the Puritans rejected Aristotle’s
teachings for an order based largely on experiential,
modern scientific reasoning founded derived from an
“indivdiual”

39. The Rise of Modern Science: The Baconian
and Puritan Epistemology
 Aristotle was the father of medicine (along with Galen) and
the philosophical mentor to the scholastic theologians
 For Aristotle, as we recall, the end of natural philosophy
(aka premodern science) was in the realm of
contemplation, speculation, and the abstract.
 The Puritans rejected Aristotle, his scholastic theologians,
a cosmological order out of “necessity”; They set up
“reasonable” religious standards to control those in their
community
 In fact, if one did not follow the Puritanical rules of
reasonable religious standards, the person was labeled a

40. The Rise of Modern Science: Burning
Witches Yesterday and Today?
 Burning the witches (perhaps anyone with an
epistemology that stretched beyond “reasonable”
religious or scientific standards) was not simply a matter
maintaining order, it was to uphold the use of nature for
mankind’s (yes, not womankind’s) benefit
 (Women, just like rest of objectified nature, enjoyed the “privilege”
of being part of the masculine order of religion, science, etc.
 Indeed, the same religion of productivity exists among the
modern Puritans (most Western Christians) and modern
Baconians (most doctors, scientists, and anyone who
works in the Western world)

41. The Rise of Modern Science:
Use and Production, a Modern Religion?
 Jerry Falwell, Baptist minister and televangelist stated,
“God created plants, oceans, and the beasts of the
earth all for the use of man.”
--Outside Magazine’s list of top 20 counter-
environmentalists
 Along a similar line, Dr. Steven Weinberger (Senior VP
at the American College of Physicians) states, “The
pressure for productivity for physicians in practice
...has both taken time away from patient care and the
physician’s ability to keep up with things.”

42. The Rise of Modern Science:
Produce or Die or Both
 Production, at whatever cost, may be the strongest
aspect of the Enlightenment religion/science

44. The Rise of Science and
The Romantic Movement
If a man walk in the woods for love of them half of each
day, he is in danger of being regarded as a loafer; but if
he spends his whole day as a speculator, shearing off
those woods and making earth bald before her time, he
is esteemed an industrious and enterprising citizen. As if
a town had no interest in its forests but to cut them down!
--Henry David Thoreau

45. Romantic Movement and Rise of Science
 The Romantic Movement arose in response to the
Modern Scientific perspective and includes authors
such as Rousseau, Emerson, Thoreau, Wordsworth,
Yeats, and Blake
 These authors stood in the face of the Cartesian
dualism, hyperproductivity, rational mechanistic
control, emotionless empiricism, and the abuse of
Nature by the Baconians
 They sought the reunion of body and soul through the
honor of Nature and all her aspects

46. Romantic Movement and Rise of Science
 They contemplated, lived as part of, and wrote poetry
about their haven of Nature where their sentiments
(feelings or passions) could be free
 They recognized Nature’s inherent order and realized
that her harmony is that of all the universe
 Emerson writes, [Nature's] enchantments are medicinal, they
sober and heal us. These are plain pleasures, kindly and
native to us. We… make friends with matter, which the
ambitious chatter of the schools would persuade us to despise.

47. Romantic Movement and Rise of Science
 Through their writings, in particular their poetry, they
described the Voice of Nature and her mysterious
reality
 Note: While they arose in response to Enlightenment
ideals, Romantic beliefs did not exactly represent a
return to Aristotle philosophy,
 This was especially true in regards to their (and our) notion
of individual and that his or her originality determines how he
or she should live (For Aristotle, the “good life” was a
universal sort of end for humanity)

48. Romantic Movement and Rise of Science
 They inspired the hippies of the 60s and the
environmental movement of the 1970’s and perhaps
some osteopathic students in 2005
 Leaving the epistemology of the Baconian
science/theology, the Romantics also explored Eastern
thought of the Vedic texts and popularized what is now
known as Transcendental Meditation (TM).
 TM, like many of contemplative meditative practices
used by Yogis, shamans, monks, (and most all cultures
that were not products of the Enlightenment) offers a
bridge to understanding “contemplative medicine”

50. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 The essence of the Crisis of our times is that we
are approaching the limits of our knowledge of the
cosmos…and are now in need of turning over
attention to the consciousness of ourselves.
--Jonas Salk

51. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 Does Salk really think that we are really that close
to the limits of the cosmos? If not, does he mean
that modern science, with its focus upon only the
physical world, is limited in its exploration of the
cosmos?
 What is the Crisis of our times? What is
consciousness? Why would a medical scientist like
Salk believe that turning attention to consciousness
and its development be important?

52. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 “Consciousness” might be defined by the “awareness of
existence (of the self, surroundings, all of reality and
nonreality)
 Humans and all reality can vary in their levels of
awareness (or consciousness states)
 A simple example: One man may be aware of the elderly lady
who needs help crossing the street while another man simply
has no clue
 One human may be aware of a global fever while another
human is ignorant or careless about such matters

53. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 From these examples, one sees that the level of
consciousness of all beings impacts their behavior
 One may consider that greater consciousness
(awareness) is a desirable end
 In fact, in many belief systems, complete consciousness
(being omniscient) may be characteristic of the divine
 Some believe that humanity as a whole, as part of the
whole of nature, is developing in its consciousness
(evolving) throughout time.
 For example, some humans at one time treated women or
different ethic groups with much less respect than they do today

54. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 Raising of the consciousness of humans (or any other
creation) may involve cognitive information
 A big step in humanity’s consciousness growth (in the
“developed” world) has been the priority of “modern
rationality” and “thinking” over more violent, aggressive
behaviors
 The Enlightenment, to its credit, sort of upheld this priority but
perhaps all too well (although with a little contortion of the nature of
“rationality”)
 Note: “Rationality” is now used justify violent, modern wars with
modern “science” creates its weaponry

55. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 But enhanced consciousness goes far beyond intellectual
cognition
 In other words, we (modern Greeks, modern scholastics,
modern Baconians) have spent generations giving such
priority to “thinking” as part of our consciousness (societal)
development that we have neglected some higher
pathways of being aware
 However, some Eastern societies or tribal peoples (made
mostly of nonGreek descendents) do not prioritize
“thinking” as we have

56. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 In such societies (eg monastic orders, tribal peoples,
Tibetian people), “thinking” is important but as part of
the larger picture of consciousness development
 While we in the West used intellectual thinking to
develop the physical matter of the universe, these
peoples have spent time developing the
consciousness beyond “thinking”
 We indeed have much to learn about how to let go of a
lust for “thinking” to become more conscious and
ultimately closer to our ultimate Self and the divine

57. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 Indeed, if Salk is correct, the future development of
Western medicine may reside in the raising the
consciousness (of patients and practitioners)
 William James (Harvard Psychologist, the Father of
American Psychology) concurs as he writes,
 “The greatest discovery of the 19th century was not in the
realm of the physical sciences, but the power of the
subconscious mind touched by faith. ...All weaknesses can be
overcome, bodily healing, financial independence, spiritual
awakening, prosperity beyond your wildest dreams. This is the
superstructure of happiness.”

58. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 Now is James really serious? He sounds like a New
Age infomercial.
 Does increased awareness really connect with
medicine? How?
 How does one in the Western world let go of “thinking”?

59. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 “The purpose of the image, the symbol, poetry, music,
chant, and ritual is to open up the inner self of the
contemplative, to incorporate the senses and the body in
the totality of self-orientation to God that is necessary for
meditation.”
--Thomas Merton

60. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 In meditation, God is present to the ground of our being
but hidden from the investigating mind (Merton)
 The mind (functioning from the Ego) often tries to
capture God and secure possession over God
 However, God, like all of our sacred creation, is beyond
objectification (even that of modern science)

61. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 In letting go of the mind (often dictated by human
rationality, desires, self-created problems, and other
mind games, there is space for the universal and/or
higher consciousness (aka intuitive nature,
subconscious) to exist and operate
 Note: your rational minds (aided by the ego’s desire for
“rational control”), at this very moment, may be
analyzing question the reality of a “universal
consciousness”

62. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 Yet, the reality and powerful nature of this universal
consciousness and intuition have been made known to
our questioning minds:
 “As we move through the world, we tend to presume that
success comes from understanding... But memory studies
have intuition leading by a country mile.”
--Taylor

63. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 Supra-cognitive disciplines such as poetry, images, art,
good architecture offer us a path for letting go of the
relentless desire for “thinking”
 Even the world of Western medicine is beginning to
pursue such meditation as part of a daily communal
practice
 Duke University Medical Residents’ Poetry time
 William Carlos Williams: on medicine and the poem,
“they amount to nearly the same thing”

65. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 While those at Duke begin to find awareness beyond
intellectual rationality, some cultures have medicine men,
or shamans, who are characterized by heightened
consciousness states that give them “an acute perception
of their environment” (Stanley Krippner)
 While the epistemology of shamans includes repeated
observations (like science), it also includes revelation from
the spirit world, from plants and animals, and “from
journeys to altered states of consciousness”

66. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 This heightened acuity, supported by an epistemology that
includes the “surreal,” enables the shamans to understand
their world in a way that may be more enhanced than that
understanding generated through Baconian science
 For example, a shaman named Rolling Thunder was asked how he could
identify healing plants he’d never used before; He replied, “I ask the plant
what it is good for. Some plants are beautiful. Some are meant for food.
Once a healing plant has spoken to me, I ask its permission to take it with
me…”
 Do you thing such an epistemology and awareness would
save pharmaceutical companies a lot of time and effort?

67. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 Some shamans actually use the plants to facilitate
altered states of consciousness for themselves and their
patients as part of the healing process
 The shaman dona Maria explains, “When someone came to me
for help, we would eat the mushrooms together. Jesus Christ is
in the mushrooms, and he revealed the problem to us.”
 Note: the use of these psychotropic shrooms; dona
Maria used these fungi as part of ceremonial practice
(the abuse of such mushrooms, while it may alter
conscious, on would not result in the same type of
healing state)

69. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 Many monks (from Tibetan Yogis to Cistercians), like
shamans, have a similar type of heightened
consciousness
 These monks spend their lifetimes in contemplative prayer
as a pathway for raising their consciousness to God
 Contemplative prayer consists of inner meditations to
spiritual practices such as Yoga, Qigong, Lectio Divinia,
prayer wheels, rosary chants, sweat lodges, and beyond

70. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 We Westerners may acknowledge that practices such as
Yoga may help humans with stress, aid digestion, sore
muscles, etc.
 But the medicine of the monk’s mediation reaches far
beyond physical ailments
 The monk’s awareness enables him or her to connect with
the universe and its people in dramatic ways
 Merton writes, “For the monk searches not only his own
heart, he plunges deep into the heart of the world of which
he remains a part although he seems to have left it.”

71. What is Contemplative Medicine?
 Because of their contemplation, these monks from St.
Anthony, St. Francis, Mother Teresa to the Dalai Lhama
see the depth of the heart and soul of the world
 In the midst of “suffering,” these monks, like Jesus
Christ, are empowered to manifest the powerful love,
peace, and healing of God
 This powerful consciousness of love and peace
resonates and heals even those far beyond whom the
monk personally contacts

72. Who Are You as A Healer?
 So, if the quest is ultimately a quest for meaning (for
sense) then where is the meaning of you as a healer,
patient or physician, coming from?
 Is there an order beyond the Ego, society’s constructs,
or the framework of modern science to understand your
identity?

73. Who Are You as A Healer?
 With the epistemology that stretches beyond modern
science, who are you?
 Why think?
 Is your mind in charge of you or are you in charge of it?
 Where is the mind? Do you generate your thoughts?
 Consider Aristotle. Feel the Romantic passion
 Love Nature. Who is medicine? Do you like her?

74. Who Are You as A Healer?
 Work, work, work to produce, produce, produce; then
remember it was all a set up.
 Watch the Puritans and the Baconians today: Love
them then and now.
 Laugh alongside those advocating evidence-based
science/theology; play their game if you’d like
 Be? One.
 O Contemplation

75. O Contemplation
“Who are we?”
Echoes the Eternal Questioner
“Why do we think and act
The way we do?”
Begs the Contemplative.
It appears as though
We simply respond to stimuli,
Rats in a cage
Running to water, to food, to sleep.
We hunger
So we eat
We try to keep up
So we study or work.
Seems normal to us:
We’re emotively moved,
And we act, think or
We’re mad, sad, or glad.
So what’s the hang up?
“Inner desperation
Ever striving for so little gain,”
Voice out the ever Quiet ones,
Always at peace in the wind.
“But what motivates your ponderings,
Your meditations, your being?” say Responders.
“Surely some stimuli precedes
Such so-called “higher life.””
“Is it hunger?”
“Not really.”
“Confusion?”
“Nay.”
“Desire for Meaning?”
“Yes, perhaps,
And, like most, simply wanting life
Life to its fullest:
The good life of contemplation, of course.”

76. “What! You contemplate
Because you desire contemplation
That’s redundant!”
“Well, do I desire Contemplation
Or is she just there
Like a being and ever present entity
Who must cajoled awake
By strange, poetic prose?”
“You are off the rocker
Oh Being of the Instrumental Age
Now you are again decrying
The utilitarian nature of it all.”
“Give it up
Contemplation can’t help,
You post-modern.”
“Yes it can;
Contemplation is alive
As sure as Plato exists.”
“But you are a rational being
Full of choices
And life hopes, dreams, and more.”
“So why dost I feel like a computer
That’s gets programmed,
Or simply a carrier of neural responses
Composed of a soulless body.”
“Why does it even have to be
About this Inward Me?
No Me is ever inside.”
“Me is all of us
We all cry out
For life beyond the system
We all want life and goodness
And goals beyond “use” or “produce.”
We don’t want to “Take the Job”
Because it’s the “highest” paying
We desire more.

77. O Contemplation, Friend
And Partner on the Path
She’s there
To help us to life, to healing, to being.”
“To rest and rest,”
Contemplation calls aloud.
“No more of these Doings
I love Beings.”
“So, okay, if “we” must contemplate,
Then for what?
So we can carry on the journey
The journey of parting the path
For Time eternal.
So for what again?
What’s the point of it?”
“Cannot you see?
You stick to the instrumental
On the “use”
Of even our lives as “we.”
The good life of contemplation
Doest not for anything or anyone
She simply is
With her, we live beyond the noisy network,
The system that plans stimuli
And responses.
Yes, Being is
And contemplation helps us
See Being there or know her/him/we/me/God.
And Being offers
To us these unifying words:
Put aside the complicating and
Simply Be-Be-Be
One with all
That lives
Is the Key.”