It is not penitence that I have trouble with. Penitence is necessary. It is the Catholic spin that it was given while I grew up. Maybe a sping that is all over Christianity. That there is shame and lots and lots of sorrow in pentinece. That penitence has anything to do with feeling bad. That if you only feel guilty enough and make the right ceremonies, then you have repented. If you begin to feel better about yourself, the nthe penance was real.

Ah, but this is all bullshit. Tonight at early (early, early) morning prayers I read of the concept of return in Kabbalah, that the right heart is the heart that is always returning to God, and as I read about this I am filled with the same longing and the same prayer I was when I began to read the Quran. (You must always begin Quran by saying the phrase: "In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate..."

The prayers that well up out of the heart are: purify, bring peace, bring peace, purify desires.

Growing up I was taught that if we prayed for these things, God would give them.

It is only now that I am beginning to think that what God really intends is for to not only desire these things, but for us to do them ourselves. Peace and love are what we must cultivate with hard work, not what God hands out to people who beg enough for them.