“What is hell? I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love”
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Friday, March 11, 2011
The Body
I was sitting in the tattoo chair again.... Getting my Foo Dog... (For Ethan..) and talking to Mel D about why people tend to get tattoos...
My tattoos.... of course.... are for my kids. I'm having a symbol of my children (in traditional Japanese) carved into my body as a reminder of the mysterious ways that God works...
The tattoo itself is part of the process for me. It's spiritual at this point. A sacrament of sorts. Ink.... going into skin.... Marking my body as a memorial... A reminder.
As we were talking....... Mel..... grinding away at my skin... he told me about a niece of his.... whose new born baby's in the hospital (not gonna make it...)
He told me that the family was already preparing for the memorial tattoo that they wanted.... sending him pictures.... with questions about what pics might work best....
For Mel's niece... The tattoo has become part of the process. The pregnancy... The delivery... The bad news... The shock.... the struggle to come to grips with it... the anger. the hurt. the questions... All working towards the incredibly difficult moment of letting it go. Letting her go.
Not My Will... But yours...
Now the family is collecting pictures of this baby and sending them out to Mel for the memorial.... The tattoo has become part of the process.
Its a post-modern Sacrament (if you think about it). The reminder of a time "IT".... happened. The hope that there's something more.... something bigger.... The leap in the dark... the decision to do the only thing you can do..... honor the child by engraving her onto your skin.
I've found that most non religious people aren't opposed to Sacraments in life. Most don't mind ceremony or ritual. What non-religious people hate is deadness... Rigidity. Legalism. The choking of the living for the sake of maintianing that which is dead.
I was discussing that with a friend... (my friend with the Buddha tattoo...) and I was surprised to find myself talking to her about wanting to participate in a Catholic Mass. The Eucharist.
The thing that intrigued her was "The Body"...
The ceremony.... taking the marked up body of the divine..... it's representation...... the bread and wine... And joining into it... with Him.... with everyone.
All of them.... All of us who have been marked with the similar type of markings that he has been marked with.
All of us... All at the same time.....
Marking ourselves onto the body.
My tattoos.... of course.... are for my kids. I'm having a symbol of my children (in traditional Japanese) carved into my body as a reminder of the mysterious ways that God works...
The tattoo itself is part of the process for me. It's spiritual at this point. A sacrament of sorts. Ink.... going into skin.... Marking my body as a memorial... A reminder.
As we were talking....... Mel..... grinding away at my skin... he told me about a niece of his.... whose new born baby's in the hospital (not gonna make it...)
He told me that the family was already preparing for the memorial tattoo that they wanted.... sending him pictures.... with questions about what pics might work best....
For Mel's niece... The tattoo has become part of the process. The pregnancy... The delivery... The bad news... The shock.... the struggle to come to grips with it... the anger. the hurt. the questions... All working towards the incredibly difficult moment of letting it go. Letting her go.
Not My Will... But yours...
Now the family is collecting pictures of this baby and sending them out to Mel for the memorial.... The tattoo has become part of the process.
Its a post-modern Sacrament (if you think about it). The reminder of a time "IT".... happened. The hope that there's something more.... something bigger.... The leap in the dark... the decision to do the only thing you can do..... honor the child by engraving her onto your skin.
I've found that most non religious people aren't opposed to Sacraments in life. Most don't mind ceremony or ritual. What non-religious people hate is deadness... Rigidity. Legalism. The choking of the living for the sake of maintianing that which is dead.
I was discussing that with a friend... (my friend with the Buddha tattoo...) and I was surprised to find myself talking to her about wanting to participate in a Catholic Mass. The Eucharist.
The thing that intrigued her was "The Body"...
The ceremony.... taking the marked up body of the divine..... it's representation...... the bread and wine... And joining into it... with Him.... with everyone.
All of them.... All of us who have been marked with the similar type of markings that he has been marked with.
All of us... All at the same time.....
Marking ourselves onto the body.
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