HAPPY CHRISTMAS

May your lives be filled with JOY!

Blessings

John O

There will be no more posts on this blog for a while

Fall    Winter    and    Spring    
in    the    island    of    Crete

 
This is the view from the Alpha Hotel and Healing Centre in Azogires, south-west Crete

This page is where you will be directed when
you access Christal Temple's blog
 
We look forward to seeing you (t)here.

The Healing and Meditation Room 

Blessings and warmth

John O

http://johnincrete.blogspot.com 

Journeying into the lands of the Goddess

Time to journey.

Out in the unknown.

To the lands forgotten

before  the times of the fathers

we now remember.

To tap back into

the resonances of our roots.

Mediterranean lands -

those islands in the wine-coloured sea

maybe some Ireland, somewhere

and the links between 

north and south

and all those west coasts

woven together by a common thread

Journey with me

loving blessings

John O

Thank you for the Back Temple Kitchen and Moving On

Today the Christal Temple community
celebrated its Divine Communion
in the Back Temple Kitchen
and then de-commissioned the Temple
and restored it to an art studio
for Val Hearder and her art

It was a very moving ceremony
celebrating over 3½ years of our
rituals and transformational meetings
as well as our facilitations and "therapies."

It was a confirmation of the power of
tantric embodiment in the power of the
Holy Spirit in ways beyond our human comprehension
and yet touching us with empowered strength.

This was the prayer with which
we finished our ritual ...

THANK YOU
for this
BACK TEMPLE KITCHEN SPACE

which we have used
in Divine order for

DEEP RITUAL
HEALING
TRANSFORMATION
and as a place of
MIRACLES

We now hand it back to you in
Deep Gratitude
and we pray
Enhanced Abundance
and
Inspired Creativity
over Val’s Art

Thank you Val and Varyan for your vision
and for welcoming us with such ecstatic joy.

We are now moving on to new places and
new callings, empowered by the Spirit.
Part of our expansion is to do with
the re-connection of the Goddess with the
prevalent western modern concept of God,
affirming the deep knowing inherent in the body
so wonderfully fashioned of God for our
wisdom, understanding, enjoyment and sustenance.

Crete is the island in the Mediterranean
where the goddess culture lived longest
before the present male-yang culture took over.
We will be undertaking a pilgrimage there,
and this you will be able to read about on
John's new European blog.
I invite you to join us in spirit
or to contact us so as to be
part of this new adventure.

Nova Scotia will remain as a place where
our transformations and rituals take place.
But, for a while, we will be concentrating
on new pilgrimages in the crucible where
our modern civilization was formed -
Greece.

Please join us in prayer and
on the inner planes.

Thank you, Val
for all you have given us.
Thank you, Christal Temple community
for realizing the deeper
shamanic, gnostic, esoteric dream in
Earth Joy and Ecstatic Reality.

New ways of being part of our community
and joining our celebrations and
transformations on the internet
are now being put in place
Welcome to join us.

With loving blessings

John O

Holy Cross Day at Christal Temple

This time in September
many of the Christian churches celebrate
feasts of the triumph of the cross, as in
The exaltation of the Holy Cross

In Zoroastrianism this is the time of
Ghambar Paitishem - when the creation of the Earth
is celebrated and the harvesting of crops.
The 15th is this year Laylat al-Qadr , an Islamic celebration
during which whoever prays to Allah receives
forgiveness for all and every sin ever committed!
And at the end of the week, Fri/Sat 18/19 Sept
Judaism celebrates Rosh Hashanah ראש השנה,
the first of the Ten Days of Awe, a time for
Repentance - returning to one's inner Purpose -
and being reunited with one's Divine Connection.

It is in this Spirit of Exalted Connection and Re-dedication
that we will at Christal Temple be celebrating a

Liturgy of Embodied Personal Renewal
with
Prayer-Dance, Spirit Healing, Inner Journeying
and
Divine Communion
giving thanks of Gratitude for our many blessings
and doing a ceremony of
Dedication of our Inner and Outer Journeys-to-come

We will be meeting on

Monday 14th September
in the
Back Temple Kitchen
at 7pm

Please come with a prayerful intention
for your own healed and renewed life
and with prayers for those who have asked.


Join us in person
or on the Inner Planes

Blessings

John O

Websites working again

The websites are working again.
Everything is "back to normal."

Yet, when things get turned around
or stopped, or something strange happens,
things are never "really the same" afterwards.

The invitation is still there to examine
what we have put our trust in,
the "normal" modes of day-to-day life,
those inner unresolved tensions,
and the "darknesses" hidden from view.

And, sometimes, simple disruptions
of the everyday put us in a frame of mind
and into a physically experienced space of
making long-intentioned practical changes
which will help us be and do what
we know in our hearts is the Purposeful Life
for us.

At our next Christal Temple meeting
on September 14th, Holy Cross Day,
we will explore and ritualize this further.

Until then,
many blessings

John O

PS For those who have missed
Tempest Baroque Ensemble's
concert program LOST IN VENICE
there is a new opportunity
Sunday 6th September
St Barnard (Arcadian Shore, ns) 4pm

Websites hacked and down

If you've tried to access the Christal Temple websites or my johnoverton.org/personal website, you'll see that you get an error message.

This is because a Turkish hacker has managed to infiltrate NewBieSite, my webhost and hack some(?) of their websites, including all of mine.

If you Google Christal Temple, you'll see his name under the first christaltemple.com entry.

Luckily all my webpages are backed-up, including the new websites that I am developing.

I invite you to send loving energy to this hacker guy (he really needs it) and healing to the web of life, as well as to the internet as a whole. As we grow in awareness into the new paradigm, more and more of the old (yes, especially within ourselves) will be showing up, ready to challenge us at ever deeper levels! Ho'oponopono, for example, may lead to peace and reconciliation, but it requires ever-deeper courage as we deal with stuff we absolutely do not wish either to own or face!

I#k&r*i%x - in co-creation with and on behalf of the Divine,
I forgive you,
I thank you and
I love you.

Ow!

Blessings

John O

Christal Temple Celebrations

Christal Temple will be having
Shamanic Divine Communion celebrations
in the next few weeks on the following dates
at 7pm in the Back Temple Kitchen:

Monday 17th August
celebrating Haga Sofia
(Unlimited Inner Connection to
Ascended Holy Divine Wisdom)

Monday 31st August

Monday 14th September
celebrating Holy Cross Day
(releasing/transforming any bonds to
suffering, incompletion & non-alignment)

At these celebrations we will, in deep union with and compassion for everything -

pray Healing over others and ourselves
share Divine Wisdom & Inspiration
do a Tantra-inspired Embodiment Ritual
engage in a Shamanic Journey
share blest Bread and Wine in Communion

Please come with
an intention or prayer
for yourself and/or
someone who has requested prayer.

Welcome to join us in person
or on the Inner Planes.

Blessings

John O

Transfiguration - Harry Potter, Jesus and more

My knowledge of Harry Potter
and his Hogwarts education, is,
by anyone's standards, appalling.

So when I googled the Transfiguration,
a festival traditionally celebrated
in the church on August 6th, I was
surprised and delighted to find
a wealth of fascinating Potter-pages
dedicated to the possibilities for and limits to
magickal transformation of matter
and especially "transfiguration" (Gamp's Law)
as part of a school curriculum.
It put all talk of transfiguration into
a completely new light!

How wonderful!
Our modern western educational system
has always seemed to me to be severely lacking
when compared to the breadth of subjects
taught at Hogwarts School!

Mountain-top experiences which transcend
our everyday experience are awe-inspiring.
Magickal and cosmic-type journeys, even better.
imagine learning how it's "done" as part of
one's on-going school education!

Yet that New Testament gospel narrative*
of the way in which Christ bestrides the "gaps"
between heavenly realms and our experience
of ordinary time and reality, can leave us with
unease and even fear - as the icons show!




Only one
"human" face
is turned to
what is going on.

The others are
hiding in
terror!





For many of us,
the "problem" with magickal moments
is our attempts to hold on to them -
to try and find out how they happened
so as to be able (we hope) to recreate them!
Not all the education in the world
(or even in Hogwarts, for that matter)
could help us with this, for,
the magick is in the moment, and
moments come of their own volition;
(as all Sondheim/Into the Woods fans know!)

Perhaps we can learn this ......
1. Let us delve into discovering how to make
magick and transformation happen
and
2. When it does happen, enjoy the experience fully
rather than trying to take a mental video.

So while we are celebrating the moment,
we allow ourselves to be fully alive,
however strange things may seem!

I think Harry Potter would approve!

Blessings

John O

* Matthew 17:1-9, Mark 9:2-8, Luke 9:28-36

Happy Lammas Day

Today, 1st August, in
the old Anglo-Saxon Christian Calendar
is Lammas Day - the Feast of the First Fruits

Based on the old pagan celebration -
an important day in its own right/rite
- opposite Imbolc (1st February) -
it is also the portal for the Chinese Medicine
Season of the Earth, the fifth and central
aspect of the Five Elements.

Monday 3rd August
we will be celebrating a
Lammas Day Divine Communion
in the Back Temple Kitchen
at 7pm

Come with your intentions of celebrating
your harvest of treasures and
in gratitude for what you have received
as the first-fruits of harvest.

Or join us on the inner planes

John O

Mary Magdalen's Day at Christal Temple

Red is Her colour.
Red is for Passion and Blood.
For Suffering, too, but also
for the Fire of Joy
and Commitment.

Mary Magdalene
attributed to
Gregor Erhart
(at the Louvre, Paris)

Christal Temple is celebrating her.
On her own day...

Wednesday
22nd July
Back Temple Kitchen
Mahone Bay
7pm

Shamanic, esoteric, Divine Communion
in honour of the Divine Feminine -
Healing, Embodiment, Prayer
and a drummed journey -
a tantric weave into
holiness and wholeness.

Please join us in person
or on the inner planes

John O

NB No Christal Temple celebration on Mon 20th

For more information about Mary
see Wikipedia here

There were three who always walked with the Lord: Mary, his mother, and her sister, and Magdalene, the one who was called his companion. His sister and his mother and his companion were each a Mary..... And the companion of [the saviour was Mar]y Ma[gda]lene. [Christ loved] M[ary] more than [all] the disci[ples, and used to] kiss her [often] on her [mouth]. The rest of [the disciples were offended by it and expressed disapproval]. They said to him "Why do you love her more than all of us?" The Saviour answered and said to them, "Why do I not love you like her? When a blind man and one who sees are both together in darkness, they are no different from one another. When the light comes, then he who sees will see the light, and he who is blind will remain in darkness.

from the Gospel of Philip

Christal Temple Celebration on Monday

We will be having a

Christal Temple Celebration
with shamanic journeying,
prayer and Divine Communion

Monday 13th July
in the
Back Temple Kitchen
at 7pm

Please join us in person
(do bring an extra cushion to sit on)
or on the inner planes.

Blessings

John O

Being Holy

So many times,
so many places,
we are tempted to make one thing
"right" or "better" by deciding that
other things are "wrong" or "worse."

After years and years of
western 3-dimensional thinking
where the spiritual had often become merely
a hobby at the side of "real reality" (ie physical)
the cry has gone up "We are more than this!"
and the predominant thought now for
the accredited modern spiritual guru is
"We are not a body."


Mmmm.

In ancient Kabbalistic thought
there was a maxim that
when one believed one had arrived at Divine Truth,
one was deceiving oneself to the maximum.
Enlightenment was instead that space of
no-knowing.

This sounds wonderful until one
begins to realize what living in the world
with no-knowing going on in one's head
would actually mean, practically!
On this webpage there is a video where
the man describes the hell of living
in a post-egoless state on Earth!
He describes his anger at being
"let down by God" - the God who
led him back into Earth-life after he had
experienced Oneness with the Divine!
In the Bible's first book, Genesis, there is
the often-repeated statement....
You cannot see God and live!

And yet, for many of us, seeing more and
more of God and living is the fulfillment
of a promise - Heaven on Earth - even of
some kind of Earthly immortality,
(whatever that may mean!)

In case I have lost you completely, here,
may I point you to this blog or
you can "google" Leonard Orr or
Rebirthing/Source Breathing.

But back to the main point....
if living on Earth is meant to be so devoid
of the earthly, then the questions pose themselves..
Why Earth in the first place? Why us?
Why Creation? Why manifestation?
The Fullness of Creation must surely demand
that everything created is necessary for its
balance and well-being, whether dense or
light, easy or difficult or anything else
between or beyond (or "somewhere else"!)

When we say "we are not a body," then
let us also say "we are a body!'
When we say "the Divine is within us"
let us also say "the Divine is outside us"
(and within-the-within and beyond-the-beyond
and not and absolutely and much more.)
This way we open ourselves to that Divine
not-knowing so that miracles can happen.

Like
Boundless Ecstatic Living on Earth!

Now there's an idea!

Blessings

John O

Midsummer(!) and Celebrations

For those of us who live further north, climate-wise,

this weekend is very important.
It affirms the sun and the warmth and
the joy of sensual, physical togetherness
(though the rain and black flies and mosquitoes
may dampen our natural body enthusiasms!)

For so may spiritual paths to enlightenment
the body and the physical realms are seen as
"lesser" ways to divine connection.
The church uses the Birth of St John the Baptist
- an extreme ascetic - as its way of getting this celebration
into some kind of people-manageable framework;
it's celebrated as Quebec knows, on 24th June.

Yet there is no part of creation which is less worthy
than any other - if we are not to make God/the Creator
a liar and hypocrite (which we do, frequently!)
So celebrating our earthly warmth and sensuality is
actually the most "godly" thing we can do -
as the goddess, pagan and some of the tantric paths
have so wonderfully shown us!

I wish you all exquisite, godly, sensual joy and
togetherness in loving, holding community,
as we celebrate this divine sun-of-suns in our lives.

Blessings

John O

PS Today's family celebration in Le Have is not taking place
but we are having a gathering 6pm on Monday 22nd

Back Temple Kitchen
Monday 22nd June
6pm (Note time)
A celebration
of summer
(shorter, family-friendly!)

Christal Temple Celebration

Monday 8th June 7pm
- Back Temple Kitchen -
Mahone Bay

- a celebration of Holy Spirit
and living as the Body of Christ Consciousness
(our Christal Temple version of Corpus Christi)
- Shamanic Journeying, healing,
divine adoration and Divine Communion

Please join us in person
or on the inner planes

Blessings

John O

Pentecost and the Spirit of Fire

Speaking in tongues
Slain by the Spirit
Fearless speaking
Kundalini rising
Explosion of Joy
Samadhi

- more than
just a connection?



Sunday 31st May
- Pentecost or Whitsunday -
is celebrated in Western Christianity
as the outpouring
of the Holy Spirit
upon the apostles.
It is a powerful festival
with many different hidden meanings.

Two and half years ago I wrote about
some healing experiences of the Spirit
in my life. You can read my post here.

My heartfelt and convinced conclusion
was then, and is now, perhaps even stronger,
that the Holy Spirit is One, whatever form
She* may choose to take to manifest
Her* power in tangible form in humans,
on Earth, in this physical Reality, and that
no one religion or group within a religion,
or spiritual group, however miraculous,
has any cosmic claim on being the only
true interpreter of how the Spirit works.

I love the tangible way the Spirit can be
experienced in charismatic Christian services.
As I implied in my 2007 article, I think I was
subconsciously drawn to these services
so that I might experience in my own body
the Spirit tingling within. Yet I was shown that
what I experienced there was the same Spirit
I experience in tantra, in shamanic healing,
and in the way music forms its own patterns
in my head when I let go of consciously composing!

In our Christal Temple celebrations all the
prayer and healing and journeying have
increasingly become places of inspired depth;
none of us have really done anything other than
dare to be whole in the presence of the Divine,
within and without and beyond - we have
"showed up" and offered ourselves in service.
But in allowing Creator Spirit to infuse us, I know
we have been made better channels for
leading Spirit-led lives in the world,
and there are miracles taking place,
quietly and powerfully in our own lives,
and in the lives we touch.

In the body lies our inner Divine Fire.
It hides in the depths of our body's most
intimate part (sacrum - the holy bone.)
When it is deeply connected to Earth
and raised in Spirit (google Kundalini!)
we become inspired by Heaven to be
whole and fearless in living all of
our Divine Purpose - herein lies real Bliss,
a state which may well be likened to the
Buddhist Samadhi.

Through that Breath of Fire Within,
connected to the Anointing from Above
and the nurturing of the Ground Below
(that Earth-oneness-with-us which
Patrick of Ireland so wonderfully
expressed in his prayers and hymns)
we have the Power to live our dream and
experience the deeper Heaven-on-Earth.
Somehow the words of the great hymn
Veni Creator Spiritus, written for this
Pentecost feast over 500 years ago,
are being fulfilled now in this place.....

The Well of Life, the Fire of Love,
Our souls' anointing from above!

In us, appeared in seven-fold dower,
the sign for us of Holy Power!

The Eternal Promise, making rich
with every Truth, our Earthly speech!

Our senses with this Light inflame,
our hearts in blissful Love reclaim!

The women and the apostles in the picture
found themselves transformed by a power
they had not known - these careful people
became bold and eager and inspired.
This power was always within them; yet
it took the Holy Wind to blow where it wished
to transform the "limited" into the limitless.
(See Chap 2 in the New Testament Book of Acts.)

May your lives be transformed by the
miracle powers of Creator Spirit -
to live that deepest Life which is
truly, divinely yours!

Blessings

John O

PS I know that I'm liable to denunciation by those
who see the Bible as God's literal Word,
only to be known in handed-down traditional
*male-centred ways within the "saved" club.
But I cannot deny the evidence of experience,
nor that inner knowing of the Spirit, working
absolutely beyond our human confines of how
Divine Creation and Inspiration "ought to be"!

HAPPY ASCENSION DAY!

Thursday May 21st 2009 -
Ascension Day!

May your ascension day be filled
with Joy and Earth-brought-into-Heaven!

The circuit is fulfilled and whole
- God has come home to God!

Wonder of wonders.
The Reconnection as it always was
and now always shall be.

How shall we celebrate?
Day after Day after Day after Day ...

Enjoy!

Blessings

John O

Christal Temple Divine Communion

Monday 25th May 7pm

in the Back Temple Kitchen -
Shamanic Drumming and Divine Communion
to celebrate EARTH-COME-HOME-INTO-HEAVEN
recalling the Triumph of Divine Reconnection
and to call forth the Holy Spirit into our own lives

Christal Temple Celebrations

Time for our Family Celebration!

On

Saturday 16th May 3pm
(we are promised a sun-drenched weekend!)

we will have
a Family Celebration in Le Have
- this is an outdoor celebration
with prayers, ritual games and a
sharing of cake.

Monday 18th May is Rogation Monday
in the old western Christian Calendar.
On this day we will pray abundance
over the crops and "beat the bounds"
- more on this soon.

There will be a celebration

Monday 18th May 7pm

in the Back Temple Kitchen -
Drumming and Divine Communion.

Please join us in person
or on the inner planes.

Blessings

John O

Connecting with Global Celebrations

Saturday 18th April in Northern Arizona
there begins a celebration called

Return Of The Ancestors

It starts at dawn on Saturday 18th April
and finishes 10 days later.

There is a request for local events to join forces
through Earth acupuncture and prayer
so as to strengthen the effect of what
is being celebrated.

This Saturday 18th April,
just before first light (!)
we will be gathering at
Sunshine Farm Community in
Maplewood, Nova Scotia
for a ceremony that connects
with the Arizona event.

5.45am
Gathering and Temple Sacred Circle
6am
Silent Meditation, Birdsong concert
6.36am
Dawn Drumming and Ecstatic Dance
after which, in the yurt, there will be
Prayers and a Sharing of Blest Wine

After the ceremony ...
POTLUCK BREAKFAST (approx 7.45am?)

This ceremony is "early-riser-family-" and "child-friendly"!

On Monday 20th at 7pm,
in the Back Temple Kitchen,
Mahone Bay
we will be honouring
Nancy Burson 's EC-well-water

Our ceremony will

connect with DNA-recalibrating water,
be a time of healing and praying,
have a foot/hand-washing ceremony,
some shamanic journeying
and a celebration of Christal Temple's
Divine Communion

If you would like some water to take home
and then share, please bring a clean bottle with a stopper
to the Monday celebration.

On Monday 27th at 7pm,
in the Back Temple Kitchen,
Mahone Bay,
we will meet for another

Shamanic Divine Communion

connecting with the end of
the Arizona gathering.

Please join us prayerfully
on the inner planes
if you cannot be present in person.

Easter blessings,

John O

PS Here's more on global links
to the Arizona event

The First Dance of Easter - an ecstatic vigil

The power of this holy night
dispels all evil,
washes guilt away,
restores lost innocence,
brings mourners joy;
it casts out hatred,
brings us peace,
and humbles earthly pride.
Night truly blessed
when heaven is wedded to earth
and we are reconciled with God!

(from Exultet, the hymn of praise for the Easter Vigil)

Tonight,
for the first time ever(!) in my life,
I danced the first communion of Easter.

This holy Easter night is the climax
of everything that has been prepared
through Lent. In this holy night
we are filled, celebrating how the Light
not only shines in the darkness, but
BRINGS THE DARKNESS UP HOME
and restores it to its Divine Place by
the most radical transformation -
not by subduing it, but by inhabiting it!
Once and for all, we can understand that
Light is for ever more now in the darkness,
so that we never need to hide our darkness
ever again! It is safe to live wholly!

It always was that way in Divine Reality,
but most have not been able to see it -
that is why guru upon guru has needed
to use radical ways to explain Real Reality!
And rising from the dead and living all
multi-realities at once, is a truly radical way!
There is a thunder, a sublime voice shouting ...

"Do you get it now?
Anything and everything is possible!
Live this Truth!
Now!"

This evening I traded my church pew for
a dance space (in the shadow of a cathedral.)
Lights were lit, an altar was set up
and adorned with colour and our prayers.
We sat in sacred circle ready to dance.
And then as the music rose, we allowed
everything in us to be safely nurtured
by the spontaneity of the dance that arose,
and at the same time were joined in
with one another as a communion in our
moving together through our inner journeys.

This holy night we celebrated Resurrection.
We celebrated Divine Inner Empowerment
in deep humility and compassion for all.
It was a perfect metaphor for the new world
that is reborn through the act of bringing
Death back to Life in ecstasy!

This holy night, I have cried
tears of gratitude to Jesus.
For this joy, for this opening,
for this daring to go there beyond everything,
for showing what is possible
for all of us.

This holy night of nights as the church
next door celebrated its holy worship,
I danced Easter into being in my body,
in my emotions, in my spirit and soul.
This night not just my mind and my head,
but also my body and my feelings know
the ecstasy and the bliss of rebirth!

Hallelujah!

John O

In Halifax, Nova Scotia's main city,
there are opportunities each month
to experience both Ecstatic Dance
and Trance Dance.
The sessions are run by an awesome
facilitator, Maryse Thuot, and her gifted
team of co-facilitators. Information
can be found on this blog.

Holy Saturday - identifying with Peter or Judas ...

It’s done.
Over with.
He’s gone.
Dead and buried.
We can go back to our ordinary life.
Dream crushed.

We have failed.
And we understand also that
we have been failed.
Betrayed even.
It isn’t as we were promised…..

or did we get it wrong?

One of the lessons to be learnt
in deep transformation, is that
what appears to be the truth,
ie the-“truth”-on-the-surface,
is so often not at all the Truth
when we go really deep down.

Even harder is the lesson
provided by Life's mirror ….
the learning which tells us that
those things and people which we resent,
despise, shy away from, get triggered by,
or shun and disown, show us
the spaces inside ourselves where the seeds
of our own healing can be found.

This past week in churches -
on Thursday evening and yesterday -
we are reminded again of two of
the friends of the guru/master Yeshua;
one “friend” who premeditates and carries out
betrayal (the betrayer’s kiss is fascinating -
Why did he betray? And why kiss Jesus? -)
the other, who never plans to disown, and
mistakenly believes he is courageous enough
to stand firm when his own life is threatened,
but who denies and weeps and flees.

And there is more than betrayal and denial -
not just that the male friends all take flight,
(the women stay, close or farther away,
depending on which account you read,)
not just that men’s worst sides come out
in ever-expanding viciousness and fear,
but that the most exultant imagined dream
is so quickly, efficiently and violently crushed.

So, who are we in this story?
(And, who do we try and avoid being?)

The god-man being put to death is an amazing
narrative that says many things at many levels.
For me, two of the most important are

- there is nowhere that the Divine cannot be found

(see my last blog-posting)
and
- the seed of even more joy lies in "the crushing" of what is.

I love the popular movement of the last few years
to encourage people to shed old limiting ways -
to let go of old hurts, of old beliefs, of anything
which stops them from becoming whole,
so that their lives may become empowered,
and that they may begin to shine brightly.
But there is a price which is not usually stated:
For a person to become whole, everything held tight -
it doesn’t matter if it’s “good” or if it’s “terrible” -
has, sooner or later, to be given up, crushed.
The radically new and stunningly blissful is
only able to emerge through the total surrender of
absolutely everything, whatever it is, to God.

Looking at the Passion story from this perspective,
perhaps Judas’ betrayal and Peter’s denial were
crucial ways for them to surrender whatever it was
that stopped them from receiving the new life -
it wasn't just about releasing “good appearances”
or no longer being trusted friend in different ways -
everything of deepest importance within them
was totally challenged and turned upside down.
(In the New Testament accounts, Judas, of course,
gives up too soon to reap the fruits of being real.
Or perhaps not. And there are also modern scholars
who don’t believe that Judas committed suicide.)
Perhaps all the cruelty and violence that we are shown
are, dare it be said, at some level a fundamental opening.
Perhaps this story, so full of horrors repeated in
so many violent places today, is an important lesson
in going deeper, in "trusting in a point beyond " -
in allowing sight beyond the hate and cruelty.

In a church I was working at ten years ago,
the midday prayers bulletin had an illustration of
God going down deep on the cover (from Africa)
showing that there is nowhere deep enough,
evil enough, painful enough, that the Divine
is not there before us (as Psalm 139* says.)

I believe we are asked to show as much kindness
and compassion as we are able, wherever we go.
But there will be times when the complete and
absolute opposite overtakes us in some way,
and then it is time to dare to go down deep within.
For me, surrender to God often means allowing
this going-down-deep journey, however difficult
or ugly or painful it may be. Especially when
there seems no rime or reason why something
awful has “had to” happen.

Let’s go back to the mirror image for transformation
which I mentioned at the beginning of this post.
There is a hidden gift here; a wonderful “positive side”
to accepting that what we see in others is also in us -

The wholeness and holy joy
which we see and honour
in the saints and gurus and friends
whom we love, admire and look up to,
is mirrored in the seed of wholeness and holiness
and the essence of the Divine Creator and
that Godly Connection within us!

Or to paraphrase the Gnostic Gospel of Philip,

we are who we truly see and get to know.

I also asked the question which character we feel
we are in this holy unfolding, leading to death.
I risk being called a blasphemer by some, but
I suggest that it is our holy destiny
ourselves to be the god-man, Jesus.
Part of this being Jesus, is the learning that
by not holding on for dear life, we also may
transcend all pain and hurt and death, and so
allow ourselves to be
reborn in glorious elation.

I dare to believe that the more of us
who are convinced of this principle,
- we are who we truly see and know -
and have the courage to live by it,
however often we may fail by denial,
or by betrayal or any any way,
the quicker our rape and pillage of the Earth,
and of each other, will cease.
And that our New Age, so longed for by Jesus,
so long prophesied by every spiritual tradition,
and so clothed in beauty by so many poets,
visual artists, dancers, musicians, etc.,
will at last be manifested among and in us
with a joy and bliss beyond our imagining.

May your Easter be full of dreams
and of rising Joy!

John O

*
If I say,
"Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,"
even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day -
for Darkness is as Light to you!
(Ps 139, vv.11-12)

A passionate lesson in non-duality

It's now 2 days into Holy Week
(well, according to the Gregorian calendar,
western version - west of Constantinople, that is )

Holy Week? Holy in what way?
Who is holy? What is holy?

Holy, according to the dictionary, means
something or someone to be revered
and comes from the old English word for
WHOLE.

I've always been fascinated by
this time of year in the Christian Church;
suddenly, it seems, there is no need to
preach dogma or doctrine or moral rules -
for everything is self-evident;
the stories speak for themselves
and we become fellow journeyers
in and through a transformational world
of cosmic, divine proportions.

There is a wonderful phrase in
the Apostles' Creed .....
after the brief crucifixion narrative
comes the sentence ...

He descended into Hell

For me, this is the ultimate confirmation
that the Divine is in everything,
however "good", however "evil" -
whatever we may think of something
or of someone, however "impossible",
God is not just "also there", but in totality!

The very Essence of Divinity dwells there!

So how do we in Western Society
get to a place where we can allow ourselves
to explore the physical and emotional intensity
of the dark places of Earth-life in safety?
And, more important , how do we access
the hidden darkness within us
- those recesses which we do everything
in our conscious power to hide
from ourselves and others?

I believe that most of us really endeavour
to live - and try to appear to live -
"good" lives. Any perceived dark faults
and cracks in our personality ......
- such things as our anger, our frustration,
our raw passion, our longing to break out,
the yearning to stamp our feet or
scream as loudly as possible,
the desperate urge to let go and
freely allow our bodies and minds to do
absolutely what they will, etc., -
we try and lock away in our body-cage
and perhaps even try to pray, meditate
and therapize them into submission.

Mind over matter we tell ourselves.

Part of western civilization's baggage is
the Gentle-Jesus-meek-and-mild Syndrome.
It matters not whether one professes faith
in the traditional church manner or not -
the cultural imprint of the erroneous
"Be good/nice, or you'll go to Hell!" is
still very much with and inside us!

Yet, not having any pathways to explore
and express the darkness inside us
is a sure way of avoiding the very inner peace
we long for! By desperately trying to avoid
our own "unacceptable behaviour" we are
opening ourselves to "Hell on Earth" - the
hidden personal misery which finds no outlet
- or worse, school shootings, rapes, murders,
dangerous abusive relationships,
and pointless, seemingly unstoppable, wars.

Holy Week actually inspires us to be whole.
We follow a man who gets so angry that he
- takes a whip to drive traders out of the Temple
shouting at them as his whip stings them,
- curses a fig-tree early in the morning because
it didn't have any fruit on to feed him,
(what happened to his morning meditation?),
- gets totally exasperated with his loyal friends
and speaks kindly to his betrayer (?!?)
a man who is so brazen that he quotes for himself
the divine name of I Am in front of the very
people (church leaders/puppet politicians)
he's just slandered as vipers, liars, hypocrites,
and then flatly refuses to even speak to
the authority that is trying him as someone
totally beneath him, etc.......

One of the points of this story seems to me
to be the example it shows of someone
who dares to be whole.
Uncompromisingly whole!
Not just following that inner knowing
whatever the cost, but also being totally
raw, real, open and vulnerable along the way!

In this totality of being there is little
space or time for duality, (except, of course, in
moments of doubt - those Gethsemane experiences!)
Shall we dare to explore what it means
to be real, to be whole, to be so impassioned
that we must follow our calling wherever
it may take us, and dare to be real and raw
as we let go and tread the path?

More on this, soon.

Holy blessings of wholeness

John O