Dumbing down, Hallowe'en and the Dead

When did
the celebration of the
Thin-ness
of the
Veil-between-Heaven-and-Earth
become an orgy
in throwaway plastic
and
unbelievably bad taste?

The Day of the Dead in
Mexico,

All Saints
(with its eve, All Hallows' Eve,
now known as Hallowe'en)
and All Souls
in Christian tradition,

and Samhain in Celtic tradition,

all coincide
with that change-of-season feeling of
"everything's different now."

The veil between Heaven and Earth
is said to be at its thinnest,
we ponder issues of mortality and
remember the dead

- some we have made into "saints"
- others we mourn
- some we may even be pleased they've
"left for good."

Have they left for good?

When the veil thins
so does our hold on what is real.
What is the truth?

In this modern age we pay much attention to
political crises, wars, economic situations,
medical breakthroughs, third world disasters
and the like,
going deeply into the whys and wherefores.
We let our television news
form our days, taking each crisis
with us into daily life.

But life in the media-news-version
is not much fun,
so we buy ouselves out of misery,
or watch anything that will
lift us for a moment out of the creeping fear
that would enrol us in its march.

The result?

A tendency to live at the extremes

- either a life lived in fear of the "real"
and desperately seeking ways "out"
to bring about something better that works,

- or inanity.

We're either crying and fighting or laughing stupidly.

Times like the Days of the Dead
pull us out of this see-saw for a moment.

What we are instead led to experience
may well give new perspectives
unlimited by television news,
and uninfluenced by what malls would have us buy.

Not easy. Not easy at all.

Questions like
Why am I here on Earth?
What is the point?

Perhaps it's easier to make a joke of this time -
"it's all just a bit of fun"

- and help companies who are totally
without any sense of beauty or artistic taste,
make money out of gaudy plastic,
("ecological" plastic that they assure us
will shrink and wither with age.)

The same happens at Christmas, but
Christmas has been so overlaid with other feelings
from sentimental to "duty and service" that
the plastic is the least of our worries!

It
takes courage
to go deep

and to plunge
the mysteries of
Life and Death
and our
intimate connection
with them.

But all this IS
a matter of life and death -

for this planet,
for each of us personally.

Niceness doesn't count for much
when faced with such questions.

And orange plastic imitations of pumpkin faces
won't get us any closer to truth,
though perhaps they may
remind us that it is
in one anothers' faces that we may see
reflections of deep truth
and a reminder of
who we ourselves are.

Have you ever looked deeply
into another's eyes unflinchingly
for 20 to 25 minutes, and seen
how the worlds become revealed to you,
new spaces in the other that you
never knew?

It is a scary and wonderful thing.

Even if we can't resist buying the plastic,
let's take this Allhallowstide
as a time
to see more deeply into one another
and use this wonderful body we have
to make contacts of another kind -
of acceptance and love.

We may even find that we start to
forgive
and even understand the
"unforgiveable" and perhaps
even thank those we were pleased had left us
for what they gave.

That is a gift which will not
shrink with age.

And it will
open the veil between
Heaven and Earth.

Blessings

John O

They passed Mary Magdalen by....

The Goddess of Christianity? Perhaps.
The one who Jesus confided in and the first to fully know him as risen?
Most probably.
An intended at-least-equal with James the Just, Peter and Paul in the early church?
Almost certainly.

Her festival was last Sunday, July 22nd.

Most churches passed her by, the Sunday-by-Sunday texts more important than daring to balance nearly 2000 years of supposed male religious "supremacy."
Here was a chance to re-establish in humility the Divine Feminine on the day, week-by-week the Christians celebrate Resurrection, the Re-empowerment of Human Beings.

By passing Mary Magdalen by, we lost an opportunity to be ourselves re-balanced and re-empowered by the most creative power upon the Earth, the feminine.

And "worst" of all for me ...

I'd forgotten Her day, the 22nd, until afterwards!

Two weeks ago, when we gathered to do the 2-hour meditation that the Hathors had told Tom Kenyon about, she came and was present with us. To re-balance and claim us for the greater Light.

For me, remembering this is a reminder to reclaim that Yin-creative self within, in a Yang-gone-mad-world - to be a part of the Divine Transformation of Earth, and to practice encompassing Love.

God knows, it is needed, now.

A few weeks ago, John the Baptist's day (June 24th) also fell on a Sunday. The radical Essene who demanded complete turn-around repentance. (They passed him by, too - is he over-the-top uncomfortable?) Maybe it's time for a dose of turnaround radical repentance - living Truth rather than fearful compromise. It would really help the balance, as well.

The "other" Mary, the "other" John.
Time to bring them out of the closet!

Blessings

John O

Thank God Ash Wednesday's Over!!!!

Ash Wednesday
the first day of Lent in the Western church
(fell on Feb 21st, this year, in case you'd missed it)
is, for me, one of the most unpleasant,
horribly challenging, joy-deprived,
grey days of the year.

And it heralds 46 more days of self-examination,
of learning to look at the shadows within,
of encouraged austerity, quiet contemplation,
feastlessness and all those things I would prefer to avoid.

(Even if Sundays are supposed to be exceptions
in honour of Jesus' resurrection -
all Sundays are really Easter Days
in ancient Christian tradition -
yet the flavour of fasting never quite leaves.)

Come on,
I'm a Fire Boar, for goodness' sake
(sometimes it's useful to quote the Chinese!)
I love feasting and warmth and sensuality
and generosity of climates and people
and an abundance of everything wonderful -
how can I possibly have anything to gain from fasting?!!

Doesn't God WANT us to be happy?

Just as well I wasn't born Greek;
the orthodox Christians have 8 weeks!

The first time I went on a Source Breathing course,
it was on the island of Gotland, Sweden
one early, sunny-but-cold April.
(By the way, for any followers of Jesus Christ reading this,
Source Breathing was started by a born-again Christian,
Leonard Orr, back in the 1970's, as part of his search
for the literal truth behind "if you believe in Me,
you will not die!" Leonard's travels have taken him
to meetings with "immortals" that seem both bizarre
and full of that fulfillment of spiritual longing
that so many carry in these times!)
Although the course was not primarily
about receiving mystical experiences,
one of its key components was
making peace with God, in order to live a life of
empowered love and compassion as "it was intended."

I had had many deep experiences of Christ,
throughout my life, in so many ways;
of spiritual community, of wonderful praying -
for many years a church life of
musical pastoral ministry was my job -
yet, though I knew God within me,
I was still longing for that community of belief where
I could completely feel safe to let myself go with
a passionate abandon that was true to who I am.
What completely blew me over
about the Source Breathing course
was the way I was suddenly surrounded by
a group of people literally breathing Unconditional Love.
And the meditations and singing that we did
brought me face-to-face with God like a naked Adam -
but this time, forgiven and embraced fully for
who I really Was and Am.

All of me.

Completely accepted and Loved.

How did we all get to this space?
(For what we all received in terms of acceptance and love,
we also gave ....)

One of the ways was fasting!
To help us stop using food as an addiction
to hide the inner shadow.
For what is not seen and acknowledged
can never be used or transformed, at least consciously.

On Gotland, that April,
as on this last Ash Wednesday,
I shivered and froze as my body tried to shake off
my inner examination.
I yawned, longed to go to bed,
longed for anything to take me away.

On Gotland, Community held me!
And, I believe, that I also held them,
as we dared to face the inner demons that had
disempowered us for so long.

And after much breathing,
after reconciliation with God,
after waiting for food and finding
how much less I really needed than I thought,
a wonderful, strange transformation occurred.

I felt able to see forward into the future again.
Not only that;
I could bask in God's presence,
I had re-found my Life Purpose, my soul's Joy,
I wanted to shout for happiness
(I'd never, ever felt this before!)
And the world buzzed with colours and an energy
I didn't remember ever seeing.

I could look God in the face.
I could look my friends, my children,
my co-workers in the face and say
"Life is AWESOME!"

Talk about being saved!!

So,
why do I hate Ash Wednesday.

Because it reminds me that,
as with a loving relationship,
if you don't cherish Life regularly and often,
you lose...
first the point of it,
and then, eventually,
Life itself.

And so, my friends,
I am required to do some
hard work!
(Fire Boar problems again!)

But Leonard Orr knew what he was doing;
though starting to breathe fully again
takes some disciplined effort,
the rewards are stunning -

For the Breath of Living is indeed
the Holy Spirit of Life,
and breathing well is the best way of coming back to
living in harmony with oneself and everyone around.
- with good help of clean water,
wonderful sensual (in its best meaning) experiences of friendship,
and the space to be able to scream for JOY!

I needed this Lent
to remind me of Real Life,
so that I could see
God.

In vibrating colours!

Again.

May your life be
Joyous and Blest and Ecstatic.

Peace and Love

John

What on Earth are you doing down there?

Down in the ditch
or behind the bump in the meadow
or in an out-of-use workman's shed
hidden under the rail-bridge,
out-of-sight,
playing, day-dreaming,
in another world.

Miles away from the cares of being "good."

And then one day,
that voice that cut into the field of fantasy,
"What on EARTH are you doing down there?"

In a brief moment,
all secrecy shattered,
all play exposed to an interrogative spotlight,
the pictures of innocence, called into question.

And then that walking home,
tail-between-the -legs,
stomach sinking, shoulders hunched forward,
wondering -
"how could something with so much fun
be so wrong?"

Many of us still have that program running -
the one that censures,
seemingly from outside, or from above.
Some of us choose to stay in religions that
honour a "war-god" who blames and threatens
if we do not behave and obey.
Some of us have denied religion access,
but secretly, the censure-program is still running
like a hidden virus, ready to strike
when we feel weak or despairing.

Actually the question is valid and very opportune -
What on Earth ARE we doing?
- but not from outside us,
but from deep within.

Some say that what is now happening to the Earth's climate
would be happening anyway
(perhaps more slowly, but the same processes,)
- they are part of the natural planetary cycle of things.
Others say that it is entirely our greed
and lack of understanding that have
brought the Earth and us to where we now stand.
If the truth is rather the latter than the former,
we might have been able to avert the disaster
that looks like happening in the ever nearer future,
if we'd acted 50... 40... 30... years ago.

Perhaps those voices of prophetic knowledge and seeing
seemed far too like adults
breaking up the child's world of enjoyment.
And now - perhaps it's too late to act,
those moments for action, perhaps been and gone.
(And just maybe, it would be happening, anyway.)

Either way, when we really look out and forward
it is difficult not to become scared, for
the nature, the size and the extent
of the hidden forces now being unleashed
are of a proportion we have not been trained to fathom.

This is absolutely not a time for blame.
It is a time for creativity.
It is a time for empowerment.
Being aware of what is "around the corner" may just
help some of us remember the empowerment we felt as children,
the "divine" connection, the invincibility -
before we were "discovered" in whatever our "transgression" was.

Sounds like the Garden of Eden in Genesis.

But let's turn it round ........

Among the Q'ero of Peru,
there is a deep knowledge that
we have never, ever left Paradise.
This knowledge is common among the indigenous peoples;
it is found on Hawaii, in northern Scandinavia, in New Zealand,
a kind of in-built pre-knowledge that speaks of the path of
growing up to spiritual and earth empowerment.
In other words -
it was our job as spiritual "teenagers"
to go against our "God-parent"
in order to find our real selves.

Suddenly,
doing "our own thing" and being "disobedient"
is actually our divine purpose, and not our "sin."
And the state-of-the-Earth and we-upon-her
exactly the right combination of what-is-needed
for us to wake up to who-we-really-are.

Yes, it is to do with the Source of all existence.
Yes, it is to do with Earth-life,
and God and the universal scheme of things.
But, most of all, it is a wake-up call to our own
God-given innate inner strength and power.
It is a wake-up call to go inwards
- to be the change we wish to see in the world
as Ghandi showed us,
- to envision and know and therefore create and manifest
another type of world,
where we co-exist respectfully with all of Earth-life
as empowered divinely-centered human beings
in something much vaster than
the "media-reality world" of conformity and limitation.

To do this, we must reopen our channels
upwards and downwards, as well as inwards,
just as we did as children,
to be our God-selves
and take upon us our power of knowing that
"All is well. All will be well."*

The invisible may well become visible
and the visible, invisible.
The weak will certainly become strong
and the strong, weak.
And all of this in a transformation of cosmic proportions.

Our choice?

- to be drowned in the huge waves of the paradigm shift

or

- in empowerment,
to surf them in Joy as, possibly,
multi-dimensional beings.

This new-world performance is actually already upon us,
like the first light before dawn.

But it is still not too late to start practising -
an opportunity we will really be blest
by taking.

Perhaps the Earth
will not have to throw us off
after all!

In Light and Joy

John O

*divine words heard by the mystic Julian of Norwich (from her work Showings.)

PS For more on our divine empowerment, see http://scripturereflections.blogspot.com

Journeys of the Spirit - the body as laughing temple?

Years ago,
I heard of the old-fashioned-sounding phrase
"being slewn in the Spirit"
and wondered what it was.
I was shown pictures of people falling backwards -
a pastor had come down from a podium
and touched their foreheads.

I wondered -

"Did he push them" (It was always a he!)
If it was "real" I wondered what it felt like.
My desire to know "real miracles" fought with
my left-brain rationality, and I felt
fear, discomfort, yearning and despair.

I remembered childhood journeys to healers
for cures for my mother's post-polio paralysis,
(and then my father's crippling arthritis) and I again
experienced that odd mixture of hope and despair.

Along came Toronto Airport Church,
nobody "pushing" or touching this time, just
seemingly spontaneous giggling and shouting;
if you'd been passing by and happened to look in,
the temptation might well have been to
call the cops - "It's the Moonies again!"
I was disturbed and strangely longing,
all at once.

The desire for connection and bliss in me
were real enough - they had been there
since earliest childhood.
My way of connection,
the way I was "brought up" and evolved,
had been through music and (anglo-catholic) ritual.
Music allowed the much-needed
cosmic flights of imagination,
and ritual gave the "dance-steps";
by comparison, the dramas of everyday earth-life
seemed pale
(except when I was falling in love!)

All through my earlier adulthood
I secretly wished for that unexpected
"something cosmic" to "happen to me"
as though from "outside"
(like I believed falling-in-love was!)
I wanted to feel a miracle happening
in my own body.

(I've later understood this
yearning for personal Gnosis
is like wanting to go home
to the cosmic womb -
but the thought was not yet formed
in a way ready to be expressed.)

When my own inner chaos
broke through the walls of propriety
the need for real transformation
"whatever it takes"
led to a series of unexpected blessings
which would realize my longing
to experience God in my body.

In Sweden it's called Liberating Breathing,
(Frigörande Andning, see Wäxthuset)
others call it Source Breathing,
- there are many names:
perhaps this breath-journey is the
"being reborn" that Jesus speaks about when
Nathaniel visits him secretly at night -
whatever it may be called, this healing-by-breathing
is the body's own process that transforms
through incredible experience as
the Breath takes charge, a "glowing"
seemingly from without as well as within,
a sometimes traumatic journey into awesome Light.

It was these breath exercises
(Source Breathing can take many forms)
that were my first re-experiences of a bodily
Journey back to My Self,
and to Oneness.

Then came a time of Reiki attunements.
Initially, I myself didn't feel anything very much,
though my co-workers said they experienced
"deep warmth" coming out of my hands when I
put my hands on their shoulders.
It wasn't until I started doing Tantra
that I really felt the energy in my own body.
It was the final ceremony at the end of the first Tantra course -
I experienced a "tingling" so strong that I felt
the whole group would start to levitate!

There was a yoga experience soon after -
I suddenly heard the "inner fire" starting to roar,
ready to explode out of my head.
(I was on my own, so I shut it down.)

There have been many attunements since,
both formal and informal,
of varying degrees of intimacy and strength.
But the most recent, and perhaps,
strangest series of re-connections, have been
the most powerful, and yet the gentlest,
like a wondrous homecoming.

Some months ago,
for our own spiritual nourishment,
my partner Helen and I started to worship
in a local fire-hall (!) taken over
every Friday night by an "outreach church"*
And suddenly I had come home to a place
where the Spirit moves so that
no-one is easily left unchanged.
With my own eyes I saw how
people fell off chairs and started
laughing uncontrollably; and
not just people falling backwards, but
also how lives were being altered,
being transformed, and happiness was
to be seen radiating everywhere!
(Stand outside a church or a temple
as people come out - if you can't see
the radiance and the joy, would you
wish to join them?)

And then, one Friday, quite without warning,
I fell off my chair -
I just couldn't stop myself.
There was nobody preaching or talking,
no-one "leading us", it was as if I'd been
pushed by a cosmic wind from the side.
And it was so FUNNY!
(The previous week Helen hadn't been able
to walk to the bathroom when we got home -
we were in giggle-fits! -
she had to crawl there like a baby!)

So what is this?

Some would say that my earlier experiences
were to do with "the devil"
and now I'd "come home to Jesus."
My upbringing would tempt me to accept this view
so as to receive possible "outside approval."

Yet I know that there is no separation.
The Divine Source is in truth
undivided.
It is our experience which knows the "Un-nameable,
in so many ways,"
as the indigenous people say.

For myself,
I have experienced the healing power of this Force
flowing through me,
in churches, out of churches,
in privacy, in the open,
in dance, in music, in sweat-lodges,
in source-breathing, in tantra, in therapy,
in workshops, in meditations,
while ascending, while walking,
in so many ways,
and I know Her Presence.

When the Q'ero shaman
had finished buffeting me at the end of
the longest initiation I have ever experienced,
he handed me a celtic cross with the words -
"Meditate on this.
I heal through Jesus."

This was my lesson in Oneness.

And the Outreach Church, my lesson in
the Laughter and Joy of the Spirit.

Now I know why Helen and I
were moved to call our place of open-faith ritual,
Christal Temple Laughing Church.

As we allow the gnosis of God,
so we may find it more difficult to walk on Earth.
The temptation now is to get so "high" on this
that we forget why we came here...

My first shaman teacher said
"If you climb to the mountain peak first,
it is your job to show the others how you do it.
That's the point."

Ascension is not primarily about "flying away",
but about being in a space of such Oneness
that all people may "come home" to Source.
There can be no real homecoming for any of us
until all are on their way home.

And this includes
all those we thought we would prefer
to fight, to compete with, to damn
or to ignore.

Then we may truly see the whole body
as a Laughing Temple on Earth,
as we fall about, weak-knee'd in
ecstatic giggling!

All blessings

John O

*Bethel Outreach Church in Blockhouse, NS

Baptism by Fire

Yesterday we looked at inner journies and epiphanies in the light of the Eastern Church's celebrations at this time of year.

After the wise astrologers have left, it is said that to avoid the ensuing child massacre Joseph and Mary took their family to Egypt. Esoteric and Gnostic christians are fascinated by this journey. Into the land of alchemy and secret initiation. (The question arises - what had Moses and the Israelite priests really been learning in the Egyptian temples hundreds of years before? Whose version to believe? And had this learning anything to do with the Essenes at the turn of the millennium, and their connections?)

Anyway, some 3 decades later, we find the (Essene?) prophet John the Baptizer thundering with a preaching that leaves little to the imagination as to what will happen if we don't "come to our senses right now." (The world seems to need these people. Al Gore and John the B could be kindred souls!) And on to this stage steps John's younger cousin, Jesus, (a fellow Essene?) and asks for baptism.

The orthodox christian version is that John doesn't want to, feeling "unworthy." But Jesus says "Do it anyway!"
The esoteric believer may see in this dialogue, words of a secret initiation. But here the exchange is done in full view - and as John immerses Jesus in the water, there is one of those Heaven-Earth exchanges that radically alter our perception of reality - "You Are My Beloved!"

For some, this is when "Jesus became Christ."

Maybe. Maybe not.

But the point is the "Do it anyway"
- no time to "waste," anymore
- I Am prepared enough for what it is I have to do
- Immerse me in this flow

When we make this decision for ourselves, the Heavens may open and fire descend. Perhaps we are the only ones who know. Perhaps others may see. But in whichever case, when we let ourselves live the life that was intended to be lived in us we become the Beloved.

Not that we were anything other than cosmic lover and beloved. But in the immersion and the fire brought on by willingness and surrender to inner purpose, we suddenly know.

Let's do it anyway! Let's celebrate this Baptism by immersion and fire!

in Light

John O

Time for an Epiphany

In the Eastern Christian world the "real" Christmas is not on the 25th December, but on the 6th (or in some places, the 7th) January. The appearence of angelic beings singing in the sky, may or may not have scared the "poor shepherds" witless (and may or may not have occurred, depending on your attitude to the viabilility of the "historical Jesus,") but the Eastern church chose long ago not to concentrate on this. Instead, by emphasising the celebration in January, she moved the focus from In-fleshness, incarnation, to God-Manifestation, epifania. (Hence our word "epiphany" - a realization of the essence or meaning of something, as Wikipedia calls it.)

It may seem odd that the church draws attention to how eastern sages used astrology and magic to find the Christ-child (the gospel reading for the 6th January.) Why rejoice over ancient wise astrologers following their inner and outer knowledge, whilst seeming to decry and villify modern astrology as an abomination, a pseudoscience practised by people led astray and worse "by the devil"? (If you want to get the full flavour of how some writers and churches view astrology, just google "astrology evil" - it makes for some very scary reading!)

Most church-people have not been taught about the early history of their church faith; this is "reserved" for the theological colleges. In fact, from the time of the early church fathers, many in authority have been very anxious that "unsuitable knowledge" should not fall into the hands of those "unable to comprehend it." The vehemence of the reaction to Dan Brown shows that little has officially changed. However scantily researched Dan Brown may have been in what he calls the facts behind his fiction, the result has opened the eyes of many to how receptive Christianity was in its "first years." Hardly an orthodox belief system, but rather, various strands and leanings, often held together by the transformative belief in resurrection, emphasising a number of different interpretations, and supported by a large number of sacred texts, (most of which had been "discarded" by an emerging orthodoxy when the Bible received its first official authentic form in 382AD!) Here was a "new" faith that was a part of (rather than apart from) the spiritual journeys of its time, enriching, explaining, clarifying many a belief already profoundly known, exploring and understanding the human journey of faith from a recently-transfigured perspective.

There was deep disagreement, too.

So what was the true nature of that which Christ practised with his friends, followers and disciples? Was the idea that we should (just) worship the guru as the manifestation of God on Earth? Was it that we should become empowered to live like him?

Like the early gnostics, I am drawn inexorably to the idea of facilitating the path of the initiate being led into empowerment by "adoption and grace," as Paul of epistle-fame would later write. Here "the initiate" is anyone who is willing to be transformed by greater truth, knowledge and experience (epifania.)

Many preachers emphasise that we "have to be saved."

For me the idea of "being saved" isn't foreign or "wrong" - I have many friends who have helped me "turn around" (the true meaning of repent) in times of seeming total desolation and helplessness; so that's the least I would expect of my God. But staying in a dependent place of "unable to help myself" is not helpful, and I don't believe that is what Christ meant us to do.

Repeatedly describing oneself as unworthy in a kind of abject neediness is certainly not the Christ's intention for anyone. (Ken Carey called this idolatory!) Empowerment and enlightenment are not just reserved for Buddhists. Intuitive knowledge and cosmic experience are not only a priviledge for a few mystics or sufi poets. We are all intended for wholeness; just as the body automatically tries to heal all wounds, so our nature is to come back to the whole, complete experience and manifestation of God within us and our lives.

To assist us, there are many helpers, seen and unseen, many tools, ancient and modern, and the God-spirit of so many names. This Saturday and Sunday, 6 - 7 January, I will join my Eastern friends in celebrating the wise use of all tools that have been given for our journey inwards to our deeper divine selves, and I will send deep love and gratitude to all my helpers in all realms and times as I celebrate Christ revealed and made plain in the world and in me.

These are my intentions:
- to celebrate the re-connection of astronomy and astrology, and the way the cosmic astrological map doesn't pre-destine but rather assists in the finding of intense personal, practical, spiritual pathways.
- to open myself to God-realisation; that the gifts I have been given may bear fruit in practical experience.
- to allow my attention towards my fellow human-beings to aid me in feeling com-passion, and to encourage me in bringing forth gifts of manifesting love and deeper community.
- to honour the paths of Eastern spiritual wisdom trodden during thousands of years by fellow humans, and to have reverence for the Oneness we all share.

I wish you a most glorious epiphany!

John O

PS For more thoughts on the magi/wise men, see Helen's blog at http://scripturereflections.blogspot.com