The preacher Thaddeus K. Martin was furious at the Texas Buddha. “How can you say that all religions are true? Jesus said he was only path to salvation. If you are saying there is any other way, you are making Jesus out to be a liar.”

Texas Buddha cupped his hands, “I didn’t say all religions are true. I agree with you that there is only one way. Only universal love will save our world. “

“Did you get that straight from Oprah?” the preacher scowled, “You are just adapting your religion to be accepted by the culture, You are taking the easy path.”

“Not so. Since the beginning of time there have been very few universal lovers of humankind, but there have been countless sectarians each claiming that theirs was the only way. It is they who have chosen the common path.”

The preacher raised his bible, “Jesus said it and he meant it. I repeat, are you saying Jesus was a liar?”

“Fear can ask the question, but it cannot hear the answer. We must not use scripture to reduce the mystery down to our own level of reasoning. We must let it raise us to a level of loving we do not currently understand. When an awakened one says “only me,” he or she is not speaking arrogantly of themselves, but as the one love of which they are a unique expression.  We must not hear their words as if spoken by an ordinary ego.

“When you sat on your mother’s knee, you could not imagine that she had a heart big enough to love each of her children as an only child, but she did. An awakened being speaks as the one heart out which of every creature is born- every butterfly as well as every person. He or she speaks as the one vine of which we are all branches. When Jesus says “only me” he is singing as the beloved. It is like when a man says that his lover is the only woman in the world. A logician cannot hear what is really being said. Only a lover can understand.

“Jesus was singing a love song, not teaching a lesson in math. He was telling us that we cannot love in general. Love is most specific thing in world.”