Brian’s Reflection: Wednesday, July 29, 2009

It is better to be high-spirited even though one makes more
mistakes, than to be narrow-minded and all too prudent.

- Vincent Van Gogh, artist , who committed suicide on
this date, 1890, age 37


I’m for “high-spirited”! Oh, ok, a little prudence now and then - and being prudent doesn’t have to equate to narrow-minded, though it often does in the sense of not being open to fresh possibilities and realities and truths.

Prudence is, to my mind, a curse of the church, of religions. Maybe prudence serves some good purpose now and then. But my experience tells me that it is usually an instrument of death. As I see it, if the Church and religions had over the centuries been more “high-spirited”, as therefore more open, much anguish and death and prejudice and war and hate and ignorance would have been avoided. Alas, religion is still the same – more often an instrument of ignorance and oppression than of healing, inclusion, liberation.

Prudent people make as many mistakes as high-spirited people. Prudence is no constant virtue. Bottom line: I believe the Gospel entices us on to be high-spirited. The “Kingdom of God” will come much faster, I am convinced, when guided by high-spiritedness than by “prudence”.

A few mistakes can’t trump or hinder the natural urge towards human glory.

Brian+