The longer I practice contemplative prayer -- daily welcoming the Divine Flame to do whatever it wills -- the harder it is for me to believe that retribution is God's way. It's not that the I Am is revealed to be soft and sentimental, quite the opposite, rather as I came to see and know my self and its unholy preoccupations through observing it in the light of God's presence, I began to experience God both delighting in us all and bearing our sins. Which happens to be the beginning and the end of the Biblical narrative.
The purpose of God's consuming fire is to burn away the fear, blindness, and wilfulness that conceal the imago dei placed within humankind at creation.
The holiness of God is not a set apartness that can't stand sin, but rather, like Jesus, one set apart to touch and heal the leper, tax collector, idolator, and adulterer in each of us. Jesus' holiness was not corrupted by contact with the sins of men and women, how can God's.
The purpose of God's consuming fire is to burn away the fear, blindness, and wilfulness that conceal the imago dei placed within humankind at creation.
The holiness of God is not a set apartness that can't stand sin, but rather, like Jesus, one set apart to touch and heal the leper, tax collector, idolator, and adulterer in each of us. Jesus' holiness was not corrupted by contact with the sins of men and women, how can God's.
