The Cyrenaian Hedonic church

We were taught to be quiet.

To kneel and whisper.
To bite our tongues when the holy fire rose.
To make ourselves small, our pleasure and our prayers polite.

But no god worth worshiping ever asked for quiet.

Sound is creation.

The universe began with a scream.
Before there was light, there was vibration.
Before there was form, there was sound tearing open the void.

They say actions speak louder than words.

But sound is action.
Every moan,
every cry,
every trembling gasp is a movement of spirit,
a wave that reshapes the air and remakes the world around us.

Be loud.
Be guttural.
Be the thunder that announces you are alive.

Let your god know that rapture warrants sound.

Your pleasure is testimony.
Your release is gospel.

The Sin of Silence is not that we spoke wrongly,
but that we stopped speaking at all.

So speak now.

Cry out.
Fill the dungeon,
the bedroom,
the temple,
the world with your name.

Make the rafters shake.
Make the heavens jealous.

And when they tell you to hush,
remember this:

Heaven has always listened hardest
to the ones who scream.

-AMEN