Love Sets Me Free

Photo courtesy of Lisa West

The recognition that we are Love is liberating, in and of itself. Mary Baker Eddy tells us, "Love looseth me and lifteth me a'yont hate's thrall". Can you guess she was a fan of Shakespeare? Old-fashioned language aside, she's saying that Love sets us free, lifting us above and beyond any hate we may perceive. I’ve mostly given up trying to change anyone, and usually I can resist the urge to want to fix others, but I've come to see that it's my purpose to show them the way to freedom through living Love. By actions and words we bring ourselves, and thereby everyone, to the realization that Love is the only reality. To live Love allows a release from past habitual thought and the pain we've chosen. Then there is no need for blame, guilt, nor forgiveness — and we are free!

“With one Father, even God, the whole family of man would be brethren; and with one Mind and that God, or good, the brotherhood of man would consist of Love and Truth, and have unity of Principle and spiritual power which constitute divine Science.” 

Mary Baker Eddy Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures Page 469:30-5

“To love yourself is to heal yourself, and you cannot perceive part of you as sick and achieve your goal. Brother, we heal together as we live together and love together. Be not deceived in God’s Son, for he is one with himself and one with his Father. Love him who is beloved of his Father, and you will learn of the Father’s Love for you.” 

A Course in Miracles T-11.VIII.11:3-6

Peace To Struggling Hearts

Many good things are happening in our world, and one of those is the recognition that Post Traumatic Stress Disorder happens to people other than those in active combat zones. Many of our addictions may be a direct reaction to abuses in our younger life. I’ve been pondering an article about the Ukrainian people who have basically been locked in battle with Russia since the 17th century. Martin Kuz is a reporter who is devoted to telling the plight of these people, and I quote him here: “This trauma is like a terrible national heirloom. But it also explains the strength of the Ukrainians. They’re bound by this idea of collective memory.” He has spoken with psychologists who advise residents who have endured loss to establish new routines which can liberate them from some of the triggers of their sorrow. He refers to “post-traumatic growth” on the other side of this war. I think we can all benefit from his conclusion: “That doesn’t mean trauma magically dissipates; it means that you recognize that you can overcome things beyond what you ever imagined — and that will allow you to have that brighter future.”

“Glory be to God, and peace to the struggling hearts! Christ hath rolled away the stone from the door of human hope and faith, and through the revelation and demonstration of life in God, hath elevated them to possible at-one-ment with the spiritual idea of man and his divine Principle, Love.”
Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 45:16-21

“The shadowy figures from the past are precisely what you must escape. They are not real, and have no hold over you unless you bring them with you. They carry the spots of pain in your mind, directing you to attack in the present in retaliation for a past that is no more. And this decision is one of future pain. Unless you learn that past pain is an illusion, you are choosing a future of illusions and losing the many opportunities you could find for release in the present.”
A Course in Miracles T-13.IV.6:1-5

All Hallows’ Eve

Photo creation from Blake Lasater

It seems many Christians are afraid of Halloween celebrations. Our local Methodist minister, Blake Lasater, wrote an explanation of this. I feel compelled to share it with you. Happy Halloween!

“All Hallows’ Eve

Traditions are established all the time, they maybe ancient or they maybe new, but they are simply ways for us to sanctify the rhythms of time. Halloween is a particular favorite of mine, probably my inner child speaking. It gets its name from the old English word for saint — hallowed.

The early church set aside days to honor those who had been martyred for their faith, but very quickly the calendar filled with saintly feast days. May 13th was the original date of All Saints, or the Feast of Martyrs, but then the Pope took possession of the ancient Roman Pantheon (pan = all, theos = gods, hence all the gods) and dedicated it to the Virgin Mary and “all the saints” in 615. By 840 the day was known as “All Saints’ Day”, and in old English, “All Hallows”, and then Pope Sixtus IV in 1484 moved it to the first day of November and gave it a ‘vigil’, where people could stay up the night before and keep watch while praying, hence our favorite holiday of mischief and candy, “All Hallows’ Eve” or “Halloween”. Many folks would go door-to-door asking for little baked goods called “Soul Cakes” in exchange they promised to pray for that family’s dead loved ones. 

The move to November 1st coincided with the first harvest, and the Pope wanted to make sure there would be plenty of food for those who made pilgrimages to their home churches. It is a great time to bring canned food to give to local food pantries on All Saints.

Halloween got mixed up with a lot of non-christian traditions and sacred days. Samhain is a Celtic festival during this same time, to mark the end of harvest season and the beginning of the “darker” half of the year. Interestingly, it is the halfway point between the Equinox and the Solstice, both of which are vitally important times for neolithic cultures. Many considered this time to be a moment when the veil between the living and the dead was at its thinnest, and the spirits could come and go freely between the realms — hence ghosts and goblins.

Werewolves go back to ancient Sumerian mythology, and perhaps were ways of explaining the existence and motivations of ancient serial killers (they are indeed monsters). Vampires were folks suffering from light sensitivities, and often that condition struck the nobility the hardest — hence the moniker, “Count Dracula”. Mummies would eventually make an appearance as early archeologists uncovered ancient Egypt, and then quickly came the apocryphal Mummy’s Curse (Howard Carter was not cursed for opening Tut’s tomb). Devils and demons would emerge from the imaginations of Medieval Christians, and somehow God’s most beautiful angel would become a fallen dude with red skin, horns, and a tail. The idea of Hell would be fleshed out as Satan’s abode, and a place where sinners were punished. That’s not quite a biblical idea, but one that emerged gradually culminating in Dante’s vivid imagination. Today Christians talk more about Hell and Satan than they do about Heaven and Jesus — an odd transformation of a religion based on grace and love and eternal life.

But Halloween was never a separate, pagan holiday corrupting good Christians everywhere. All cultures have in their sacred beliefs times set aside to remember the ancestors, and to be reminded that death is nothing to fear. The darkness may descend — as it always does — but the light and life will go on. For me Halloween is that time of sacred mischief that whispers we have nothing to fear from the dark. The Light has come into the world and conquered the darkness. Ghouls, goblins, and demons have no hold over us, and our Halloween revelries are simply a time to remember that good news.

Don’t let the religious zealots frighten into believing it is an evil day.”

“The mind can make the belief in separation very real and very fearful, and this belief is the ‘devil.’ It is powerful, active, destructive and clearly in opposition to God, because it literally denies His Fatherhood. Look at your life and see what the devil has made. But realize that this making will surely dissolve in the light of truth, because its foundation is a lie. Your creation by God is the only Foundation that cannot be shaken, because the light is in it. Your starting point is truth, and you must return to your Beginning. Much has been seen since then, but nothing has really happened. Your Self is still in peace, even though your mind is in conflict. You have not yet gone back far enough, and that is why you become so fearful. As you approach the Beginning, you feel the fear of the destruction of your thought system upon you as if it were the fear of death. There is no death, but there is a belief in death.”
A Course in Miracles T-3.VII.5:1-11

“We cannot bring out the practical proof of Christianity, which Jesus required, while error seems as potent and real to us as Truth, and while we make a personal devil and an anthropomorphic God our starting-points, — especially if we consider Satan as a being coequal in power with Deity, if not superior to Him.”
Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 351:16-21

Appreciate Yourself

Photo courtesy of Blake Lasater 

Maybe you think you should be appreciated more, or perhaps you know someone who is always "fishing for compliments". Both of these beliefs fall under the category of expecting something which you already have. When you appreciate yourself, when you are grateful for the wonder which is you, that's all you need. And it is an all-encompassing gratitude! This recognition is one of the after-effects of loosening the bonds of materiality. The more we let go of expectations and beliefs, the more opportunity there is for Truth to take their place. We needn't do anything but clear the way! And that’s what we’re doing!!

“The ego is afraid of the spirit’s joy, because once you have experienced it you will withdraw all protection from the ego, and become totally without investment in fear. Your investment is great now because fear is a witness to the separation, and your ego rejoices when you witness to it. Leave it behind! Do not listen to it and do not preserve it. Listen only to God, Who is as incapable of deception as is the spirit He created. Release yourself and release others. Do not present a false and unworthy picture of yourself to others, and do not accept such a picture of them yourself.” 

A Course in Miracles T-4.I.10:1-7

“When man is governed by God, the ever-present Mind who understands all things, man knows that with God all things are possible." 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 180

Where All Children Can Thrive…

Image: Giovanna Photography

“How do we love all the children? Not just our children, not just the ones who look like us or who have resources, not just the human children but the young of birds and salmon and redwood trees. When we love all the children, when that love is truly sacred to us in the sense of being most important, then we have to take action in the world to enact that love. We are called to make the earth a place where all the children can thrive.” ~ Starhawk, The Spiral Dance

“I bless you, brother, with the Love of God, which I would share with you. For I would learn the joyous lesson that there is no love but God’s and yours and mine and everyone’s.” 

A Course in Miracles W-127.12:4-5

“Jesus loved little children because of their freedom from wrong and their receptiveness of right. While age is halting between two opinions or battling with false beliefs, youth makes easy and rapid strides towards Truth.” 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 236:28-32

There Is No Justification For Cruelty

Photo courtesy of Blake Lasater

The belief in separation fosters fear, and fear and cruelty go hand in hand. We think we’re defending ourselves, our loved ones, or values which are of importance to us and our way of life. To this defensive end, we are willing to attack others in our words and actions, not listening to the voice of sanity which divine Mind is forever supplying. If I witness attack thoughts around me today, I will remember that those propounding such ideas believe they are justified in their defenses. And in this remembrance, I will see them as a child of Love, knowing this is their true Being, and praying that they may realize it, too.

“And we solemnly promise to watch, and pray for that Mind to be in us which was also in Christ Jesus; to do unto others as we would have them do unto us; and to be merciful, just, and pure.”
Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 497:24-28

“With love as enemy, must cruelty become a god. And gods demand that those who worship them obey their dictates, and refuse to question them. Harsh punishment is meted out relentlessly to those who ask if the demands are sensible or even sane. It is their enemies who are unreasonable and insane, while they are always merciful and just.”
A Course in Miracles W-170.6:1-4

Infinite, As Many of One

Contemporary Art Museum in Denver, Colorado

Photo by Aaron Springston

“Conscious human individuality is not individual as one of many but infinite as many of One.” [Margaret Laird] The enormity of Oneness may seem more than we can fathom, but knowing we are an individual reflection of goodness, and united therein, seems much more manageable! Realizing our spiritual nature as the experience of divine Love opens a new world in which I am not a victim of mortal mind and its manifestations. I am unafraid to take a stand for harmony and peace, knowing that it is our birthright as reflections of Mind.

"As mortals gain more correct views of God and man, multitudinous objects of creation, which before were invisible, will become visible.When we realize that Life is Spirit, never in nor of matter, this understanding will expand into self-completeness, finding all in God, good, and needing no other consciousness.”

Mary Baker Eddy Science & Health Page 264:13-19

“Miracles make minds one in God. They depend on cooperation because the Sonship is the sum of all that God created. Miracles therefore reflect the laws of eternity, not of time.” 

A Course in Miracles T-1.I.19:1-3