Beyond History

 There are many biographies of men and women in many times in the life of humanity on this planet. There are also great myths and stories that hint at more than the encapsulated soul waking in a body on the face of earth.

A favorite study of mine is the New Testament. The synoptic Gospels, Mark, Matthew and Luke, focus on life stories about Jesus and share some of his teachings, a bit about the eternal Christ. Then we shift to John, Paul, Hebrews that tell a different story, a story about a universal Christ. In "Perrenial Philosophy," Huxley says:

Each in his own way wrote about the eternal "not-I" of Christ rather than the historical "I"; each in his own way stressed an element in the life of Jesus, in which, because it is more-than-personal, all persons can participate. 

So we move from the amazing teacher and healer, walking around Galilee, to Paul's Christ in you the hope of glory.  We move to the Cosmic Christ, to the Christ Eckhart called us to birth in our souls, to the Divine Energy with which we can relate and participate, to Hebrews' High Priest and High Christology.

It is a shift that may be quite a jump for some people. We can see it in the writings, when we look deeply and with new eyes, as Jesus said, Except you become like a little child, you shall not enter the kingdom.  Read through the New Testament and see the shift, allow an internal shift. Allow yourself to participate in the Christ energy, the Divine that calls us each and every moment of our lives, stirring something within us until we at last listen and turn.

Humans With and Without God

 History shows us a sad story of humankind, peppered with golden moments of humans rising above the lower tendencies to glorious moments- so we know we can rise, it is possible. So much of our history, however, exhibits violence, hatred, prejudice, jealousy, meanness, herd mentality, wars, and other horrible things.

So what can we do? Do we have the desire and will to rise above the lower behaviors? Do we realize how dangerous it is, with all the modern technology, to play with the dark side?

My vision shows me the way up and out is to align ourselves with the Divine, with the Higher Power, with God. There are pitfalls there too, because historically and currently there is violence in religion; there is ego; there is theology made by violent and power-hungry men. The story of Christianity is not just the man from Galilee and his teaching, but it is the long history of fighting over fine points of theology, even unto death. Early on there was the fear that if they got theology wrong, God would be angry and punish them with violent weather and earthquakes. There were wars over things like whether Mary was the mother of God or the mother of Jesus, over whether Jesus had one or two natures, over when he became God's son, etc. There was intrigue. 

Even today there is a huge variation of what is the "true" Christian theology, arguments over who is right and who is wrong. Families are split over disagreements over whose church is right. Nations try to destroy churches and imprison advocates of "other" points of view. 

I am most familiar with the Christian story, and  I know there is some of this in other religions too.

All of this, I consider to be life without God. The ugliness glimpsed above is not what any great teacher taught, it surely is not what Jesus taught.

Life with God is a whole other thing. It is Peace that passes understanding. It is Guidance from the Highest Source. It is Love. It is Joy. It is Kindness. It is Compassion. It is Oneness.

If we want life with God, let us heal our brokenness in prayer, introspection, forgiveness, and release. Let us open ourselves to the Highest Light, the Highest Teachers, the Noblest Way, and then walk it the best we can. Let us strive to be all we can be, forgive ourselves when we falter, and pick ourselves up and continue. 

We can change the human trajectory one person at a time, lifting and leading, waking up, and walking with The Divine Presence that is with us always.

P.S. Go back and read my "Turning" article earlier this year on June 6th.

Tethered - But to What?

I've been seeing a vision of tethering. That is to say, being attached with a stretchable cord to something that is hooked into a person on one end and the thing on the other. This is, of course, not visible to the eye, but nonetheless a very real connection that influences the person.

For example, you keep thinking about a negative experience from your past. Each thought makes your tether to it stronger, your feelings stronger, and as it strengthens, it controls you more and more. It is as if this past event is going on, over and over again. It skews how you view the present and the people in your present. It keeps you imprisoned to old shadows.

Of course, to get free, florgiveness is important. Also, diengaging the tether with visualization is important. And then, tethering to the Spiritual, rather than the shadows of the past, is the ultimate freedom.

Tethering to the Divine, opening to Unconditional Love, rooting yourself in that, is the blissful experience of Freedom, of all being well with your soul. 

As Meister Eckhart told his listeners centuries ago, Mary birthing the Christ Child means little to me unless I too can birth the Christ in my life and soul. Let the spiritual birth happen in you. Make ready by untethering from all shadows of the past and tether to the Eternal Holy Presence that calls to you. As we take a step toward God, open arms of Divine Love greet us and welcome us home.

Where Is Our Connection to God?

 Origen, that great authority, suggests a parallel: that God’s Son, God’s image, is in the ground of the soul like a living spring. If earth is thrown on it, earthly desire that is, it smothers it, covers it over, and it vanishes from our ken. But in itself it remains alive, and on removing the soil that was thrown on from without, we see it again.                              --- Meister Eckhart

There is so much to consider here. First, I find it interesting that he is quoting Origen. He was the great thinker of early Christianity, 185-253 C.E. Later Origen was called a heretic for several odd reasons. Here is one of the greatest mystics quoting him 1260-1328 C.E.  So apparently, he saw genius in Origen, as have I.

Anyway, I appreciate the visual of a living God-spring bubbling inside of us in our souls. But then we throw dirt upon it and cover it up. It is unharmed, but we are cut off from It. We are walled off, helled off, from God.

As we remove our negativity, fears, anger, resentments, false ideas, etc, the dirt is removed. We put it there, we take it away.

As Meister Elkhart says later in the sermon:

When the artist makes a statue of wood or stone, he does not put the image in the wood; he chips away the wood which hides the form. He gives the wood nothing, he takes it away: carves it out where too thick, pares off overlay, and then there appears what was hidden.

We find God never left us, was always there, right where we left Him/Her, under our own pile of dirt, in the center of our soul. 

When Your Heart Drops

 There are moments in life when our hearts feel like they just drop. 

This week I had one of those moments.

My husband had a stroke on July 30. While in the hospital, he had a pain in his side, so they scanned it. They said he had appendix cancer, then they said peroteneum cancer. This week the surgeon put a camera in his abdomen, took biopsies, and put a chemo port in his shoulder. The surgeon said his abdomen is full of cancer, and it is likely that chemo could only give him a little more time. My heart dropped. My tears flowed. This Wednesday we go back and get the biopsy results and suggestions of what to do.

I know with surety that life continues beyond here. I know our bodies are sort of suits our souls wear so we can navigate earth and learn and get experience here. I know our bodies are made of earth and return to earth and our souls are divine and eternal. I know this not on second-hand information, but on my own personal life experience. So I am not afraid of the transition from life here to the next existence. 

And, because I love my husband and have been blessed to be married for 37+ years, I want him well and healthy and to stay here with me. My selfish self shouts out, NO God, heal him, let him stay with me. My spiritual self softly counsels me, ask for his highest good, not yours. Tears well up, and my heart drops again.

Of course God is in charge, not me. We should all be thankful about that. Imagine if we ruled with all of our conflicting wants and desires. Chaos!

We had been rolling along, hopeful we would finally get our assets restored very soon, making plans for foundations and lifting others, making plans for our future. And then the stroke and then the cancer. My heart drops just writing it.

So, God, I surrender. I ask You to Guide us. I ask You to bring forth the Highest Good for us, even if we don't understand, even if You don't want to explain. I let my fallen heart fall into Your care and keeping.So be it.

History Is Now

 I'm reading " The Jesus Wars," and remembering how the themes of history repeat themselves ad nauseum. Perhaps we fail to learn from those who were here before, or this planet has a set curriculum, a gauntlet we all must walk. We succeed or we fail. 

It is widely thought that those who fail have to try again as many times as needed, to at long last succeed. And some of those who succeed come back as teachers and some as Avatars.

What would succeeding look like, feel like?

There are huge hints from major and minor teachers, from scriptures and mystical writings from those who remember.

Some I've mentioned before: Unconditional Love, compassion, non- attachment, peace, kindness, generosity, devotion, Oneness with the Divine.

See for yourself. Read the writings of spiritual greats, such as the Commandments and Psalms and Proverbs, the Bhagavad Gita, Lao Tse, Buddha, Jesus, the great mystics such as Rumi, Hafiz, Meister Eckhart, Hildegard of Bingen, Thomas a Kempis, Julian of Norwich, Teresa of Avila, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Teilhard de Chardin, Rufus Jones and countless others. You will see a thread of thinking connecting them.

You will feel a deep inner pull to the eternal truths, as if old friends you just remembered.

Compassion or Not?

What is compassion? Knowing we are not unique, that we are in this together, our joy and suffering shared.                       --- Matthew Fox

We share this planet and all that is here, from air and water to knowledge. We share the hopes and dreams of all humans- a good life for our families, a safe place to live, freedom, etc. If we ruin our planet home, it is ruined for us all. If we lie, viciously compete, cheat, create fear and hatred, we all suffer.

Psalm 85:10 says  Love (compassion) and faithfulness meet together; righteousness and peace kiss each other.

The path of Love/Compassion is taught by all spiritual greats. We hear it from every corner, yet so few live it, and fewer still consistently live it.

I muse - how would it look? We would be interested in other people, their hopes and dreams, their ideas, how life looks through their eyes, accepting them with kindness. We would not insist everyone agree in every detail with us. We would be free of hostility towards ourselves and others. We would collectively find a way to deal with those who insisted on violence (any form, such as cheating, stealing, physical), endeavoring to help them heal their pain, so they could live free of inner torment that caused them to hurt others.

I know this is unlikely, but it is not impossible. Let us strive to begin a Love/Compassion revolution today by doing all we can to show up in our lives as walking talking Love/Compassion, as Kindness in action.