It may seem, from the infant’s point of view, that he’s achieving something. But in fact, the mother is doing almost all the work. However, the reactions of that infant are part of the birth process. He doesn’t have to know what to do, though. But if you were a stillbirth, the birth would be a lot harder. So the aliveness of the baby being born is actually helpful to the birth process. And the same is true of our aliveness. And all of our anguished desperate and hopeful attempts are futile attempts to invent rituals and invent myths. They do not create the real rituals and the real myths that we will live in. But they are part of the creation of the rituals and the myths that we will live in.
The wheel of time has brought us back around to the earliest cathedrals, built into the landscape. We’ve returned to Lascaux Cave. The next stage of our spiritual development could just as easily take place—has probably already begun—in dark tunnels etched with strange graffiti, among the standing stones of unfinished overpasses. Initiates will follow hidden voices into cement chambers lit by candles; spray-painted sigils will hold mysteries for contemplation; the ceiling will disappear into the shadows above, stretching higher than the dome of any basilica, and it will be more than enough.