Heaven's Antidote to Depression? Christ's and Creation's beauty that is around us, and within us

In time it comes to us all: that depression, anxiety, and obsessive thought loops retirement, aging, and loneliness seem to bring.

But I was a bit surprised when my parish priest presented an icon to me recently, that it was of a saint well-acquainted with all of those things. 

Hmm. Perhaps Father Paul at Salt Lake City's Sts. Peter and Paul Antiochian Church had an inkling of who I might need for a special intercessor in our ancient faith?

St. Porphyrios suffered these dark odysseys of the mind and spirit for much of his life. It began not long after his birth in 1906, in Evia, a small Greek village. At 14, he ran away to a monastery on Mount Athos, later serving as priest blessed with (painfully learned) insights into the spiritual and mental struggles of those who sought his counsel as a confessor at an Athens hospital.

For him, it was more than compassion. By the time of his repose in 1991, his counsel was widely known as transformative. St. Porphrious' prayers and insights had become miraculous for those or burdened by despair, addictions, and mental illnesses -- and perplexed doctors and families seeking answers.

"Don't think about your passions and sins," he often said. "This about Christ, and he will set you free. When you are troubled by negative thoughts, don't fight them -- simply bring Christ into your heart."

How to do that?

Embrace that Beauty in Christ and within His Father's Creation.

We can find it flowing on the notes of sacred music, and in the tones and words of an ancient faith's prayers and chants of worship; we look our that window and see it in a sunrise or sunset; beauty shines in the smile of a child, and can warm us through encircling arms of a friend or loved one;  or it whispers to you on that meander through mountains, meadows, forests, and flowers, a journey capped by the splashes of water falls discovered just beyond a trail's next turn.

What we see, smell, hear, and touch in nature outside of ourselves also finds a home within lonely, stressed hearts and minds, where it is beckoned by that eternal love we were created to nourish deep within our beings.

Beauty, the antidote of the saints, was waiting for me and my wife of 53 years, Barbara, as we explored northern Utah's Wasatch Mountains Alpine Loop this week.

Thank you, St. Porphyrios, for your wisdom, insight, and prayers. 

Thank you, Our Heavenly King, Comforter and Spirit of Truth, for it all.

Marital Sea Change: Same-sex, polygamous rulings death knell for dominance of 'traditional' secular marriages?

So, is the cultural and legal sea change toward same-sex marriage a portent for unraveling of traditional marriage as we have known it?

Of course it is. You must decide yourself, according to your own beliefs and conscience, whether that is a bad thing or some sort of societal leap forward.

I can hear the cries of "hater!" and "bigot!" now, but hear me out: my opening statement is rational and, to my mind, irrefutably logical.

In the past two weeks in the state of Utah, arguably the bastion of all things conservative and where voters overwhelmingly voted to limit marriage legally to one man and one woman, not less than TWO court decisions have turned the world on its head, marriage-wise.

Both came from the federal courts. First, a judge gutted Utah's long-time law banning polygamous marriages (a historical move that cleared the way for statehood more than a century ago, when the Mormon prophet gave up the doctrine of plural marriage).

Equal protection under the law, and the inability of the state to argue the harm to society, et al, were keys to that decision.

Ditto for another federal judge's decision late last week striking down the state's ban on same-sex marriage.

Monday morning, hundreds of gays and lesbians lined up at courthouses to get their licenses, where clerks were under orders to comply with the ruling.

Of course, the state of Utah is appealing both decisions. But the historical course is inevitable. Both decisions, sooner or later, will be upheld. 

This fight may not be over, but it is decided.  

The next battleground could, and likely will be whether, and to what extent, business owners and churches can exercise their faith-based resistance to the morphing definition of marriage.

Talking whether a bakery or caterer can legally bow out of a same-sex event, or whether a church can keep its tax-exempt status, or ability to perform "legal" marriages, if it does not conform to the politically correct tides.

Same-sex marriage/rights advocates argue that will never happen . . . just as they did that approving same-sex marriage rights would not have a slippery slope effect where polygamy would benefit from the same arguments.

What IS marriage, legally? It IS, regardless the apologists' who insist the LGBT Pandora's Box has not been toppled, a definition that is now wide open . . . if not in actuality now, inevitably later.

If same-sex marriage is legal, and if polygamy is legal, where are the restrictions for anyone, other than minors, engaging in this particular legal contract, etc.? 

 

Why not, then, a bisexual/polygamous marriage or any other variation of genders and numbers of partners? 

Any attempt to place limits on marriage, by any definition, will be mortally wounded by the same arguments that got us to this point.

Decades ago, I read a science fiction series where in marriages varied by gender, number and even the definition of what was "human."

One "family" consisted of a man who had cloned himself multiple times, at various ages, and married him-selves as well as other men and women and artificial intelligences.

Then, I thought: What an imagination!

Now? Not so much.

I don't have the answers to this whole thing. And I refuse to be the judge of others. Not my job.

But as an historian, and a believer, I have to observe that when spiritually informed morality is removed from the societal equation, as we seem to have done with our secular society, the very fabric of its institutions can become, certainly, unrecognizable, and perhaps unraveled . . . if not in present fact, then possibly in future reality.

Beauty and imitation: Real world unrivaled when God's 'special effects' are displayed

One of the reasons I enjoyed the movie "Avatar" so much was the stunning special effects, the beauty of the exotic, extraterrestrial jungles, floating mountains, plants, animals, etc., created for the backgrounds.
The same appreciation was evident in the "Lord of the Rings" movies in the mammoth sculptures on the rivers, mountain fortresses and especially the abodes of the Elves with their surreal light and detail.
All fiction, those things.
But, to me, they pale next to the reality of breathtaking beauty in our "real" world. I was reminded of that when I stumbled upon this website, featuring the photo above -- and more than 20 others.
Stunning scenes, all the more so because they are places we can visit, touch, see, experience and . . . wonder.
So, take a look, and then, I dare you, go back to your daily tasks without a lingering sense of the inexpressible beauty of our planet, and gratitude to its Maker.