Letting go and letting God

Spiritual resource to share: familiar, time tested life truths


There’s a lot to consider when trusting God – like what it means to let go. It’s talking about letting go of one’s own plans, speculations and opinions to make way for the grace and surprise of God.

There’s a discipline to this, I know. Letting go and letting God is not about letting yourself go, like letting things slide or ignoring things. To let go of self and ego and trust God is a discipline like many disciplines. For instance in dance: I studied dance for about ten years and can only truly say that I felt I was able to truly “let go” and dance only a handful of times. Let me explain and then draw some analogies to healing prayer.

For years, I danced up to five days a week. We always started out with stretches on the floor, stretches standing, then on to small phrases of movements then to movements across the floor. It was repetitive and in certain ways, contemplative. Then we would work on the larger performance piece.

After weeks, even months of class, we performed. This was where the discipline paid off. With the spontaneous connection of a live audience, the art of dance kicked in for me. Because of the discipline, I had more freedom, strength and confidence to move, to jump, to remember the intricacies of the steps, the stretches, the contact with the floor and with one another. The letting go was done because of my trust in all the things that I had learned. It was freeing, empowering and affirming! It all connected and made sense! The dance then was truly inspired.

Something in that perfect coincidence of balance, grace and energy being made manifest resonated deeply with the audience and that inspiration is what moved the audience to a full round of applause!

My approach to prayer is somewhat similar to my approach to dance. I can start with the study of things I know: the Weekly Bible Lesson, reading through Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy or her other writings, the Bible, other inspiring articles. I read these things in order to be stretched – to feel an expanding of ideas (otherwise it is just bland repetition like only reading the letter without the spirit).

I take a new idea and expand it to my life. I then move with this thought to my practice, my patients, to the world. I practice with this one idea throughout the day.

When I get a spontaneous call from a patient, it all comes together. The discipline of the daily work yields up to the inspiration of the moment. I let go of all speculation, human opinions and fears, and listen. I let God guide the conversation and later, let God reveal to me what I need to know. God becomes nearer and dearer to me, and it follows that whatever weight the limited and material arguments had, fall away.

If divine Love is becoming nearer, dearer, and more real to us, matter is then submitting to spirit.

Healing happens as a revealing of our perfect reflection of perfect God. There is something in that perfect coincidence of health, harmony and abundant love being made manifest that resonates deeply with me. And the whole reason for this is for the patient to experience this as well.

I grow in my trust of God’s supremacy. Every day, I can let go more easily and trust God more readily. It is an infinite lesson that I learn every day.





To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

Be still

Spiritual resource to share: quietness and peace

It's no mistake that when Mary Baker Eddy talks about prayer in her book Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, that she repeatedly urges us to vigorously shut out the clamor of daily life and concerns.

"To enter into the heart of prayer, the door of the erring senses must be closed."
"Lips must be mute and materialism silent."
"The closet (of prayer) ...shuts out sinful sense, but lets in Truth, Life and Love."
"....we must enter the closet and shut the door."
"We must close the lips and silence the material senses."

Maybe it speaks to the discipline needed to actually get to the point of stillness and openness in our thought where we can feel God's peace and warmth. This type of prayer affirms the fundamental, primitive nature of God's goodness, aligns consciousness with all that is pure and true and makes us aware of God's full approval and delight in His creation, that is, in us.

A well-loved poem reflects this expectant prayer:

Doves*
William B. Lynch

I want
the words to flutter
around you and land softly
on your shoulders in peace.
I want you to hear them
tell you of heaven.

Stand still
and they will gather.








*From the book Ideas on Wings - a collection of poems from the Christian Science periodicals, The Christian Science Publishing Society, Boston, MA 1978
photo © Igor Nikolayev - Fotolia.com

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Christmas presence

Spiritual resource to share: true giving

I received an email today. In it, the writer talked about his recent trip to the Middle East where he saw many of the Holy Land hot spots. What struck him was that above every spot where some sacred activity was reported to have happened, some type of institution was built. It was even harder for him to imagine the original event given the buildings and all their attempts to institutionalize those sacred moments. And he asked himself - how much institutionalization, traditions, and history have tried to bury the living Christ? How much have I let it be buried? These are probing and necessary questions, especially pertinent now during the Christmas season where commercialism and overscheduling are so prevalent.

I keep a running list of "whatsoever groups." These are groups that are doing some life-transforming things, and I like to increase their exposure on my site - even as modest as it is!

The "whatsoever group" idea came from a quote from the Bible which actually came from a letter written by Paul to a small but growing church: "Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things."

Today I got another post on my facebook about a group that works to provide clean water worldwide. It is put in a context that has a life-transforming message for us all. It is my gift to you: an opportunity to "think on these things" and to share your thoughts about the presence of Christmas in your life.




For more info, check out http://www.adventconspiracy.org/


This Christmas season, may you give generously, live deeply and have many moments of peace, stillness and satisfaction! Merry Christmas!


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Lessons from the Dogslayer

Spiritual resource to share: eternal life

In thinking about life and death, I go back to a pretty simple explanation I gave my sons a number of years ago. This was written a while ago........

(Micah with his first hamster, Cinnamon)
Dogslayer was our last hamster, having been named for the curious effect he had from our Rottweiler - Mocha. At their first introduction, the hamster stretched forward to smell Mocha's nose, which sent Mocha cowering back. No amount of coaxing could get Mocha to at least touch the hamster. Hence the name, Dogslayer.

Both sons are teenagers now, so when when Dogslayer died, it was not a very big deal. We put his body in a nice padded gift box and lovingly placed it in the garbage. That was it.

The first time the boys experienced the death of their first hamster was when they were about 6 and 9. It was a big deal. My younger son cried, which made my older son upset because it was his pet, and both of them didn't understand why the pet died.

In praying about how to explain immortality, death, life, I came up with something that I think helped them both. We talked about what a loving home we gave to the hamster and this home probably made the hamster feel very loved and cared for. But the clincher was to understand that life goes on and all the spiritual qualities of this hamster - being adorable, satisfied, friendly, funny - go on as well.

Then, I asked my sons to think of a number. One gave me the number 8. I wrote "8" on our chalkboard. We could all see that written number. Then I erased the number "8" on the chalkboard. "Where did the 8 go?" I asked. "Is there no longer the number 8 because we can't see it anymore?" Well, of course, the answer is that the eight always exists because it is an idea.

From here, it was an easy analogy to help us see that the wonderful qualities of the hamster are still with us even if we can't see the hamster anymore. I think they got it. Enough so, that soon after, we got ourselves another hamster.

Mary Baker Eddy often refers to death as a transition or a phase:

In the illusion of death, mortals wake to the knowledge of two facts: (1) that they are not dead; (2) that they have but passed the portals of a new belief.

Death is but another phase of the dream that existence can be material. Nothing can interfere with the harmony of being nor end the existence of man in Science. ... God, Life, Truth, and Love make man undying..

I have often looked back at that lesson with my sons, illustrating that life is eternal. When we understand who we are spiritually - as an idea or child of God - we can never lose one another. God, Life, Truth and Love make us undying, continuing on to grow, learn, progress. And understanding this, we can find peace in our own eternal and infinite nature.







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wide awake at three in the morning

Spiritual resource to share: your prayer

Both my dog and I have not been able to sleep all night. I recognize this cue and go to my desk to listen and pray. A poem from one of my favorite poets comes to thought and I'd like to share it with you:

Someone needs my prayers
by Pam Chance

When I wake in the night
and I don’t know why
and I cannot settle,
but stare into darkness—
someone needs my prayers.

When another day begins with
feelings of disquiet,
unrest, despair for no reason—
I can be sure that somewhere
someone needs my prayers.

And on the brightest of days
when everything sparkles
and my joy suddenly
has an undertone of sadness—
someone needs my prayers.

I say I pray already and I do, for the big picture,
for the unbearable, intolerable,
the unjust, unfair, unsupportable—and still,
someone needs my prayers.

I may think of myself
as of a different race or creed,
as being more than, or less than,
or too far away to get involved—and yet,
someone needs my prayers.

Living and moving in divine consciousness—
a child of spiritual oneness
held in Love’s ceaseless heartbeat,
why am I surprised that I can sense when
someone needs my prayers?

I feel, more than hear,
the echoes of a struggler’s pain—
the reverb of the broken,
the oscillation of despair—whenever
someone needs my prayers.

And in my own struggling times,
when inner tumult renders me
incoherent and each moment
builds to incapacitating misery—someone knows
I need their prayers.

No prayer hangs in space unanswered.
No cry is lost—and as I pray,
I becomes we in the encircling
fusion of Love that heals all hurt when
someone needs our prayers.

To read more of Pam Chance's work, click here.



Photo of Copenhagen by OlliK
All rights reserved
Anyone can see this photo



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Arise! Shine!

Spiritual resource to share: the nature of light

It is all about light this month! As we enter into the season of light, I wanted to dive into the very nature of light and see if its physical nature can open our thought to more about the spiritual nature of light.

A quick browse through some websites about the physical nature of light and a favorite article gives me this:

• Light can travel through a vaccuum.
• All light can be in touch with all other light instantaneously*.
• Light is energy.
• Our human eyes can only see a fraction of the full spectrum of light.
  

Contrast that with Jesus' remarkable cry "I am come a light into the world, that whoseover abideth in me should not abide in darkness."

Or with the version from The Message: "Jesus summed it all up when he cried out, "Whoever believes in me, believes not just in me but in the One who sent me. Whoever looks at me is looking, in fact, at the One who sent me. I am Light that has come into the world so that all who believe in me won't have to stay any longer in the dark."

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary on the Bible sheds some light on this passage:

Our Lord publicly proclaimed, that every one who believed on him, as his true
disciple, did not believe on him only, but on the Father who sent him....By daily looking to Him, who came a Light into the world, we are more and more freed from the darkness of ignorance, error, sin, and misery....

Christ is the Light. And this Light shows us the way, it illumines, enlightens, is not heavy, chases away the darkness and reveals what is true. So let's mix this up and see what more we can learn about the spiritual nature of light.

Light can travel through a vaccuum. God's light and love are everywhere. There is no seeming vaccum.

S&H 266:6 Would existence without personal friends be to you a blank? Then the time will come when you will be solitary, left without sympathy; but this seeming vacuum is already filled with divine Love.

All light can be in touch with all other light instantaneously*.God's love is universal. One Mind governs all God's children. We can pray for others across the globe and they can still experience healing.

S&H 411:3 If Spirit or the power of divine Love bear witness to the truth, this is the ultimatum, the scientific way, and the healing is instantaneous.

S&H 559:1 The "still, small voice" of scientific thought reaches over continent and ocean to the globe's remotest bound.

Light is energy. The energy coming from light brings warmth, renewal and movement.

S&H 510:27 Light is a symbol of Mind, of Life, Truth, and Love, and not a vitalizing property of matter.

S&H 249:5 Let us feel the divine energy of Spirit, bringing us into newness of life and recognizing no mortal nor material power as able to destroy.

Our human eyes can only see a fraction of the full spectrum of light. We are constantly growing spirituallly. The more we understand of our spiritual nature, the less materialism we have to deal with.

I Cor 13:12 For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.

*For more reading about light from an astro physicist's view (who is also a Christian Scientist) read on..... "Physicists today are finding some interesting properties of the light they study.... For example, at one level, all light particles seem to be in touch with all others; the quantum physics term for this phenomonom is called entanglement. ... Essentially, according to the equations, instantaneously means they are really already in touch with one another....So the underlying idea seems to be emerging that from light's perspective, it doesn't take time to go from point A to point B in the universe. If all "entangled " light "knows" that and fills the universe, then it is possible for all light to be in touch with all other light instantaneously." (from article "More Understanding, Less Matter" by Laurance Doyle, July 11, 2005 Christian Science Sentinel)

an advanced era

Spiritual resource to share: enlightened thought


It fascinates me to see how a church service is seen through the eyes of one newly introduced to Christian Science.

Most recently, I made a new friend who has been practicing Christian Science for a number of years. She is also an astrobiologist. She shared her first experience at a church service and her impression. "I felt like I had landed on another planet and was in an advanced civilization."

I just laughed! But I felt it was true! Mary Baker Eddy recognized Christian Science as being in advance of this age. But in order to make this understanding practical, she saw that "a great sacrifice of material things must precede this advanced spiritual understanding."


She goes on to say, "No impossible thing do I ask when urging the claims of Christian Science; but because this teaching is in advance of the age, we should not deny our need of its spiritual unfoldment. Mankind will improve through Science and Christianity. "

Reading Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy and the Bible are the best teachers in learning how to practice Christian healing. Science and Health is full of encouragement along the way assuring us that "spiritual ideas unfold as we advance" and that "evidences of progress and of spiritualization greet us on every hand."


In my own practice of Christian Science, I find that I am constantly learning new things. Even though my list of situations and conditions healed grows, I am in awe of the depth of God's love and the detailed intelligence that governs all things - from the timing of a meeting to the balance of the stars.

MBEddy writes "Advancing spiritual steps in the teeming universe of Mind lead on to spiritual spheres and exalted beings. To material sense, this divine universe is dim and distant, gray in the sombre hues of twilight; but anon the veil is lifted, and the scene shifts into light."

As I shed more of my material beliefs - and to me this means anything that limits, divides or deteriorates - I also see more of how omnipotent God operates. And the more I understand about God's ever-present Love, omnipotent Truth and intelligence, the more things unGodlike ( or material) fall away. The scene is shifting into light.






To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

God's love for you

Spiritual resource to share: accepting God's love

I just finished another conference call testimony meeting today. This includes selected readings from the Bible and Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker. Today's readings were based on the theme "God's love for you." I loved putting this together -- searching Scriptures to see just how God's love was articulated and how Science and Health expanded on Love to uncover its healing principle.

In the Bible, I John writes about love that I will liberally paraphrase. He must have been thrilled to have had this idea about God. He must have felt a sense of relief in that recognition of what he always knew to be true. Everything he learned took on new and more profound meaning with this acknowledgement of God's love: the big "AHA" moment that transformed how he thought about God and how he thought about himself and others. I can see him talking to a group of people:

"Listen to this! Try to even imagine the love that God has given to us. Let's plumb the depths of the deepest love we can fathom. Yes! God is even now calling us His children.....We are precious, we are the beloved. Yes! Right at this very moment, we are the children of God....Will we take the time to really get what this means? Are we going to believe this? Think of it. God is Love. And the very fact that we are aware of love means that we are aware of God. We live in Love and Love in us. And that cements our relationship to Love. And because of our closeness to God, we don't ever have to be afraid." (taken from parts of 1 John chapters 3: verses 1 to 3 and 4; verses 16, 18, 19)

John is cool - in the way that calmness is cool. He knows, he loves, he is gentle and kind, visionary and confident. King David also wrote songs and poetry about God's love for him. This King was known for his adventurous spirit and spiritual curiosity. He knew remorse and repentence, joy and peace. He made big mistakes, but he did glorious things. I love this song about his most intimate and loving relationship to God. This is from the Contemporary English Version of the Bible:

Psalm 139
You have looked deep into my heart, LORD, and you know all about me. You know when I am resting or when I am working, and from heaven you discover my thoughts. You notice everything I do and everywhere I go. Before I even speak a word, you know what I will say, and with your powerful arm you protect me from every side.

Where could I go to escape from your Spirit or from your sight? If I were to climb up to the highest heavens, you would be there. If I were to dig down to the world of the dead you would also be there. Suppose I had wings like the dawning day and flew across the ocean. Even then your powerful arm would guide and protect me.

Your thoughts are far beyond my understanding, much more than I could ever imagine. I try to count your thoughts, but they outnumber the grains of sand on the beach. And when I awake, I will find you nearby.

God's assurance and love fills up the Bible in its messages and letters to God's children -- and that means all of us.

Different versions of the Bible from Jeremiah 31: 3 bring the point home:

"I have loved you with an everlasting love;
I have drawn you with loving-kindness.
"I've never quit loving you and never will.
"Expect love, love, and more love!
With love age-during I have loved thee, Therefore I have drawn thee [with] kindness.
"I love you people with a love that will last forever.
“ Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love;
Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you.

God's love for us is infinite. All we need to do is accept it.



To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

Parenting: giving our kids our best

Spiritual resource to share: our spiritual inheritance

Last Christmas, I heard the Hallelujah Chorus of Handel's Messiah being played over the radio. My older son crossed the room and I found myself tearing up when he asked "What's wrong?"

I remember being in a choir while in High School and singing this with hundreds of others in choir and orchestra. It was such a thrill. We were so jazzed and inspired, we were singing at the tops of our lungs. I lost interest in whether or not the notes were right on. This loud noise that came from all of us, at once, sounding relatively in tune was an amazing experience!

Part of my role as a parent is to make opportunities for my kids to experience life - its joys and thrills and then to be there when things seem to fall apart. How many times have I wanted to "give" an experience to my kids that I have had. At that moment, hearing Handel's Messiah, I realized that I can't give them all of what is wonderful and mysterious. They need to find and take that on themselves.

It was a bittersweet moment. All I could say to my son is that life is an incredible trip. Go far, drink deeply. My dad once said that I should go out, explore the world. I could always come back, lick my wounds, but then go out again. Wise words from an old adventurer himself.

What we give our kids - aside from the basic food and shelter, millions of words of advice and counsel and our example - is to share what we have inherited from our brilliant, spinning world and to give them permission to explore it at their own time and in their own way.









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breathless

Spiritual resource to share: moments that take your breath away

"All nature teaches of God's love to man...." Yes. This I know to be true. To take in the awe of a mountaintop, the stillness of a lake and the tenderness of a hummingbird, and then to realize that the same Creator of these intimate and infinitely lovely creations is the same Creator who has created us - and has created us in His/Her own image and likeness. Wow (but said in a hushed and curiously, quizzically, wondrous way)

w o w.

I have been cataloguing in my mind the many times when the natural world reminds me of God's love and when nature blows me away with its power, beauty and grace. There was the time:

While driving to pick up my son from school, I turned a corner on a lonely highway and startled two bald eagles. They flew up and continued flying - one on each side about five feet from my car. We kept moving together for a surprisingly long time, until they realized they couldn't gain on me and flew off.

When we lived on a small lake, our neighbors across the way raised white homing pigeons and trained them. On clear and warm days, I could watch these white birds flying together in circles above our lake.

In this same area, there was another couple who raised caribou and lived beyond the forest preserves from us. On cold and crisp nights in the dead of winter, I could hear caribou bellow out their soulful calls to one another.

In the spring, I walked my sons down our gravel road through the woods to their bus stop. Whenever the weather was warm enough for another bloom of mosquitoes to hatch, we could count on an army of dragonflies to swoop in and help us decrease the mosquito population. The dragonflies were so numerous, that we could stretch out our arms and the dragonflies would tickle as they landed on them. The sun glinted off their wings. We giggled all the way to the bus stop.

Our current home is fringed by a creek that joins two larger lakes. In the warmer months, a loon couple flies over from one lake to another in the morning and evening, giving their haunting calls which start and end our days.

Glittering snowfalls, booming ice on a lake, the crystal clarity of a star lit night, it just doesn't end! What have been some of your moments?



All photos by Gabe Korinek and copyrighted

To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

those things that never change

Spiritual resource to share: constancy





I have just read a thoughtful article “Oldest Holocaust survivor tells a story of faith and courage that's out of the ordinary.” It’s about Leopold Engleitner, considered the oldest Holocaust survivor today. His recent appearance at the Frankfurt International Book Fair brought further attention to the life of an ordinary man made extraordinary under extreme conditions.

The one constant throughout his life, whether it was making skiis, being a farmer, or living in a concentration camp, was his love for God and his love for honesty and goodness.

“Darkness cannot put out the Light. It can only make God brighter” wrote an unknown author. And this was the case for Leopold. Many of us will never experience the extreme conditions that he did. But his experience showed me how important it is to nurture those elements of love that he did throughout his life: to love one’s work, to care for the details, to stand up for honesty, to have integrity, to do good things.

Each of life’s experiences will draw out from us our reservoir of spiritual qualities whose source is God. Those spiritual qualities make up who we are. They are changeless. And whether we have a high profile life whose actions will impact many or have a quiet life with more modest aims, we can always base our actions on this reservoir of spiritual qualities. And it is our practice of these spiritual qualities that makes us ready and able to meet any of life’s challenges, however big or small.







To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

Celebrate Native American Heritage Day in the United States!

Spiritual resource to share: our heritage

“For the first time, federal legislation has set aside the day after Thanksgiving — for this year only — to honor the contributions American Indians have made to the United States.”

This is the first year that National Heritage Day is being celebrated, having been passed into legislation by Congress and signed into existence by President Bush only one month ago. Although controversial, it brings out important points about what we honor and how we honor one another – specifically those tribes who first lived off this land that many of us call home now. It is purposely set for the day after Thanksgiving.

What I am honoring today is the noble and unselfish act of the Wampanoag Indians who kept the pilgrims from starving that first winter in 1621 – this act being referred to as our first Thanksgiving. Their ability to cross cultures, help at a basic humanitarian level, care for feed and teach a foreign group how to survive in an alien environment – is something we can work to achieve as our legacy to the world. It is a heritage to be proud of.

I am also honoring the work being done in my community. I’ve had occasion to participate in many community meetings about healing a divide that has come between the whites and the native tribes in my area. The call to understand one another has been made and a number of efforts have been underway – Ojibwe is taught at the high school, community groups have been educated about tribal customs, a church put on a workshop and talk about white privilege that was attended by an uncommonly large and diverse group, and much more.

I am also honoring a lesson learned about God and mankind. “Anishinaabe” is a word I learned that means “first or original peoples.” A tribal elder explained that in essence, we are all first people. I reasoned that we are all direct descendents from God. Diving below the surface of culture, traditions, history and character, we come to the purely primitive spirituality of who we all are: direct expressions of one God.

Looking at the world, we can claim our native heritage to Truth, to Love and to Life – all of which defines God. From the student at Oxford, to the hostage in Bombay, to the Ojibwe teacher in rural Wisconsin, to the grandparent in Buenos Aires – we share an amazing heritage under one God – from whom we are all directly connected.

This fundamental truth of our common heritage impelled the Wampanoag Indians to help another people to survive and thrive. It is the same fundamental truth that impels us all to prove our heritage and pray for one another, heal one another, and help one another. The outcome of this? Mary Baker Eddy explains it in terms most broad and practical:

One infinite God, good, unifies men and nations; constitutes the brotherhood of man; ends wars; fulfils the Scripture, "Love thy neighbor as thyself;" annihilates pagan and Christian idolatry, — whatever is wrong in social, civil, criminal, political, and religious codes; equalizes the sexes; annuls the curse on man, and leaves nothing that can sin, suffer, be punished or destroyed.

photo copyrighted by swisshippo - Fotolia.com


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Conference call today! Share your healings and inspiration!

Spiritual resource to share: your spiritual journey - your healings, your inspirations, your joy

Hi All!

Every Wednesday at noon (time in Wisconsin), a group of Christian Scientists who manage the website csdirectory.com, put on a conference call that is a combination of inspirational readings and a spontaneous time for sharing healing stories and inspiration from the study and pratice of Christian Science -- aka a testimony meeting. I have given the inspirational readings a few times and so appreciate that we have a way to join with others who don't have a church to go to or can't make it to a service!

I'm going to be reading on the topic "Humility: washing one another's feet" today and invite you all to come!

You can go to this website http://www.csinteractivechurch.org/ and get all the information you need. But in a nutshell, from the US, you call 1-201-793-9022 and then you'll be prompted to put in the access code of 7040344.

Hope to see you there!







To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

the race towards compassion

Spiritual resource to share: educational channels that inspire, transform, predict and feed the demand for spirituality

Karen Armstrong explains the Charter of Compassion

For years, even decades (!) I have been keen on tracking the movement of thought - past, present and future. One similar thread I have seen is the broadening of the demand for spiritual answers and for spiritual responses to current challenges.

There are three new channels I would love to share with you. Each brings out the demand for compassion and spirituality, the expression of spiritual ideals and the unifying possibilities of spirituality and religion.

The demand for spirituality

I'm reading an horizon-opening book called The Way We'll Be: The Zogby Report on the Transformation of the American Dream” by John Zogby Here's an excerpt from a review:

Book in a nutshell: Americans will face the challenges of the 21st century with creative approaches to consumerism, a cooperative worldview and an inclusive view of spirituality.

That's according to Zogby, president and CEO of Zogby International, a polling company that canvasses about half a million people every year to gauge public opinion ....

In survey after survey, he finds respondents more apt to be satisfied with less material wealth and more spiritual satisfaction.

Mr. Zogby also identifies four meta-movements that are redefining the American dream: living with limits, embracing diversity, looking inward, and demanding authenticity.

The expression and mainstreaming of spiritual ideals

What I am intrigued by is how well Zogby's identified movements coincide with a growing interest in becoming more accepting of diversity. One such example is with international youth exchanges. In the secular Rotary International Youth Exchange program that my family has been involved with, we have gotten an incredible education of what it means to be multi -cultural. This is a summary of a paragraph from a newsletter for students and families that are involved in the program.

"Successful culture-crossers who are able to build strong intercultural relationships tend to share the following traits: open-minded and accepting; tolerant; calm in ambiguous situations; empathetic; adaptable; perceptive of others and their environment; and they take time to reflect on their experiences and learn from them."

Tolerance, openness, empathy... wonderful qualities rooted in the spirit of good!

And these qualities are also front and center with another growing movement that is setting the groundwork for unifying diverse groups through the Golden Rule:

the unifying possibilities of spirituality and religion

In February 2008, Karen Armstrong, author, religious thinker and former nun "called for a council of Christian, Muslim and Jewish leaders to draw up a “Charter of Compassion,” which would apply shared moral priorities to foster greater global understanding. Her interfaith initiative was awarded the $100,000 TED Prize." This effort recognizes the Golden Rule as the fundamental link to all world religions.

These are such encouraging signs of the blossoming of spiritual ideals!

Can you add to this list? What are you seeing in your life that gives evidence of the demand for spiritual answers and responses to current challenges?

To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

all-harmonious

Spiritual resource to share: harmony in all things

Photo by Joseph Kamenju

Mary Baker Eddy was radical enough in the mid-1800's to put forth the idea of God as Father- Mother in her spiritual interpretation of The Lord's Prayer, and I love her for expanding the idea of God as feminine and masculine.

Our Father which art in heaven
Our Father-Mother God, all-harmonious.

It is interesting to me that the spiritual interpretation of this line (in italics) includes “all-harmonious.” Walk with me on this one while I break down the all in all-harmonious:

• Harmony is the governing force that causes all details, daily demands and noble works to conform to the foundation of harmony: Love.


• Harmony is the discerning force that divides all opposition from the good and right endeavors and dissolves the opposition; beliefs in limitation, the pride of power and the power of pride, envy, etc., all fade before the radiance of harmony.


• Harmony is the attractive force that makes room for the joyous and happy work of blessing one another. Others naturally want to be a part of what is inherently theirs: goodness, productivity and purity.


• Harmony is the balancing force that blends right timing, right work, right resources and right energy together in actions that show us that all good is possible, right here and right now.

Your thoughts on harmony?

To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

honest achievement

Spiritual resource to share: commitment to good works


The Urban Nutcracker from Skillimon on Vimeo.


"The devotion of thought to an honest achievement makes the achievement possible."

I'm inspired to see others' commitments to excellence, good works and progress. It's an affirmation that good is possible. It inspires me to become even more steady in my own commitment to grow in grace and in the practice of Christian Science. MBEddy offers some helpful guidance for those committing themselves to do good works:

... self-denial, sincerity, Christianity, and persistence alone win the prize, as they usually do in every department of life.

I have one such friend who has made an incredible commitment to use dance as a tool to inspire and empower youth and communities. Not only is this friend, Tony Williams, talented and experienced, but he has the humility and sincerity that one sees in leaders of many progressive institutions.

His company and school, Ballet Rox, puts on an annual show the "Urban Nutcracker." My older son got in at the ground floor and performed in its first and second years. Every year, there has been more growth and progress and it has expanded its audiences and shared its inspiration.

Enjoy the clip above and take in the celebration that encourages us all to deeply commit to our own paths of blessing others and see where it takes you!

More information about the Urban Nutcracker and how you can support it:
Press release on the making of a documentary about the Urban Nutcracker

Get involved





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"It's about hope"

Spiritual resource to share: hope = positive reassurance

I had one of the landmark experiences in my life when I was working internationally for a publisher. I was involved in a nation-wide effort to restore hope to a country whose economy bottomed out around the year 2000. I won't go into too many details here, but I helped to set up a nation-wide tour of public lectures and member workshops throughout this country. The whole process of identifying where and when to go, what messages to use, who would we be talking to, etc. involved deep prayer and listening.

The results were profound and inspiring. It certainly wasn't a one time fix, as all realized the need for consistent prayer to persistently break through the fear and uncertainty that threatened. But it was a way to firmly put our stake in the ground that said fear and uncertainity cannot reign over any of God's children. It was a way to share with the public ideas that strengthened the nobility of our neighbors and opened up possibilities for solutions. Soon after the second string of lectures, we got reports of hope restored, a higher sense of expectation for good results, and thrilling accounts of people finding their way to security for themselves , their families and their communities. I am still in awe of how powerful these ideas were and are.

We worked with many ideas, such as:

Under a paragraph heading of "Positive reassurance" Mary Baker Eddy wrote: "The fact that Truth overcomes both disease and sin reassures depressed hope." Depression comes from a false belief that there is something more powerful than good. The opposite of depression is the expression of that good! Truth - that God is infinite and that good is infinite - reassures us with what our spiritual roots have always claimed.

She goes on to explain: "It (Truth) imparts a healthy stimulus to the body, and regulates the system." Infinite channels for good, for unity, for peace thrive and when we give our consent to this possibility, thought is drawn to its healthier expressions. Truth regulates our body, our community, our world. Truth systematizes action, governs with balance and grace.

Simply put, good is possible, NOW.

Our family had a precious relationship with an older woman who lived with us for well over a year. Her great-grandfather was a slave. I can only imagine her great wonder at this election and pride at the rapid strides that have been made in this country due to high expectations and giving our consent to progress.

But regardless of the outcome of this election (it is midmorning on Election Day), there has been a deep-seated hope stirred up. Why? because more people are giving their consent to the fact that all good is possible now and that we are capable of far more good than has ever been required of us. We have a choice to take that higher road that recognizes the highest good: that God (as Mind, intelligence) governs every system and governs every action. "The real jurisdiction of the world is in Mind, controlling every effect and recognizing all causation as vested in divine Mind." We can expect progressive change that blesses us all.





For another inspiring account of hope from a "swing-voter", click here.



To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

whatsoever things are of good report.........

Spiritual resource to share: our reach

Phil 4: 8 Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.

I have always loved doing my own trends oriented scrapbooking, but now the internet makes it possible for me to team up with others and cull some of the most amazing and encouraging ideas happening world wide. I have to thank my blog readers and facebook friends for continuing to scour the 'net for some of the most cutting edge ideas that are "true....just....honest....pure....lovely....(and) are of good report." I will be posting them at the end.

Mary Baker Eddy, prophet-like in her ability to see the growth and development of mankind, wrote in her book Miscellaneous Writings (p. 232):

This age is reaching out towards the perfect Principle of things; is pushing towards perfection in art, invention, and manufacture.

The proliferation of innovation and invention has been growing exponentially since the mid-1800's. In addition, the need for global cooperation, interfaith dialogue and re-thinking the way we care for one another and for the earth have become prominent issues of our time. It is exciting to think of what is ahead for us all. Hopefully, many of us have asked and acted upon this question:

Why, then, should religion be stereotyped, and we not obtain a more perfect and practical Christianity?

To work out our own salvation and to be a blessing for our families, neighbors and others, I realize that

It will never do to be behind the times in things most essential, which proceed from the standard of right that regulates human destiny.

When I look for ideas and trends, I look to see what things are challenging the status quo, are more reliant on things of the spirit than material things and look to see the breadth of the blessings. Those are the ideas that give form and function to the way we live and love and lead to a future growing in peace, sustainable productivity and joy.

Proportionately as we part with material systems and theories, personal doctrines and dogmas, meekly to ascend the hill of Science, shall we reach the maximum of perfection in all things. Miscellaneous Writings p. 232

Here are some recent finds on the web that are brimming with hope, provocative awareness and intelligence.

1. This week on TED.com, John Hodgman goes in search of lost time, while Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi helps us find our flow. Kristen Ashburn shares powerful, humbling images of AIDS in Zimbabwe, while Paul MacCready offers a soaring talk on his work to save the planet.
2. Movies based on true stories that celebrate change agents:
   The Great Debaters
   Movie : The Music Within
3. And speaking of music.............. Click on the above for a look at a documentary "Playing for change: Peace through music" A friend wrote, "....this is a beautiful piece of film and music. Here's the link to the program. The film and music start at about 4:00 minutes. I can't recommend this one enough."
   
   
   
   
   
   To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

S N O W ! ! !

Spiritual resource to share: surprise

OK. I live far north. I should expect this kind of thing. But it is always a surprise. And I noticed that there is a special thing that happens here. The sun comes out when it snows. It's magic.

Here's a post I wrote when I first discovered this phenomenon:

Snowfall in the sunlight

I turned the corner into my living room and there it was...........beautiful glittering snow in the sunlight. And this against a backdrop of a field of snow bordered by black and white birch trees and evergreens and a semi frozen creek. I gasped. I have never experienced this sort of thing before (or never paid attention enough), that is, precipitation falling at the same time the sun is shining.

In this case, feathery round snowflakes were falling thick and fast, catching sunlight on every flake. Amazing.

I ran to get the video camera. The batteries were out. I rushed about to find the digital camera. My husband had taken it. Frustrated, I realized I couldn't capture this moment on anything but my memory.

I slowed down and looked out again. I took this time to take it in. A show of beauty, just for me. It would not last, but it did not matter. I was in a natural fantasy land of fat falling glitter-puffs. It was altogether lovely.

Beauty and love have alot in common - harmony, radiance, attraction. Listen to this juxtapositioning of beauty for love in this Bible verse from I Corinthians 13 ( New International Version - UK) and you get an idea of the gentle inspiration that I yielded to while watching it snow.

(Beauty) is patient,
(beauty) is kind.
It does not envy,
it does not boast,
it is not proud.

It is not rude,
it is not self-seeking,
it is not easily angered,
it keeps no record of wrongs.

Beauty) ... rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
(Beauty, like) Love, never fails.

To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

there are no beige prayers

Spiritual resource to share: deep and profound desire

Omnipresent by Sonja Maneri

Have you ever approached your meditation time or spiritual study time feeling that this was getting old? Or read sacred writings and felt that you weren't getting anything out of it?

I was talking over these questions with a friend of mine who, in my estimation, is a brilliant designer. We had just finished talking about home design (her speciality) and I was amazed at how quickly she could draw conclusions as to harmonizing color, balancing mass, determining a focal point and incorporating green systems all synergistically coming together in a development called home. The overall effect was not about window size or trim color (although those were components), but it was about creating a home in which people feel, well, at home.

What was it about this creative process that was so energizing, surprising and satisfying? How can we apply these principles to our prayer?

Prayer and art are synonymous to me. Good art always expands and stimulates thought and moves you forward, transforms you to a degree. Likewise with prayer.

So, back to the questions. Stay with me while I work out an answer.

Let's take the word develop. "It's a good word," said my friend and she cited Webster's dictionary definition. Its etymology says it is from the Old French desveloper, desvoluper which means to unwrap, expose.

Other meanings:

• to make visible or manifest
• to work out the possibilities of
• to create or produce especially by deliberate effort over time
• to make active or promote the growth of
• to move (as a chess piece) from the original position to one providing more opportunity for effective use
• to cause to unfold gradually

and on and on.... really - there is a lot to be said for this word and how it relates to prayer. Read through this list again and think of applying it to prayer.

So to sum up, prayer is about unwrapping ourselves and growing into visible possibilities. OK. That's fresh! It is dropping whatever isn't working ( isn't Godlike) and seeing Life's possibilities unfold. Now I'm in.

There are times when I have set my schedule up so that I read one specific thing at this time, and give myself room to read other inspirational literature at another time. But I need to remember that this study in and of itself is NOT what makes good things happen. God's law (aka good things) is always happening. My prayer and study time are only effective if I see that it brings me in line with what already is.

God is in control. It is our yielding to God's Love, it is our shutting out whatever is distracting that brings us into prayer.

I remember seeing my friend at work. She had a direct approach to her work. She goes into a room and is quiet. During this time, her thought is actively engaged in seeing what already is there. Using her love of geometry and color, she is able to see what needs changing to bring the room in line with the more desirable qualities needed in a home. Suggestions follow, maybe to change the lighting, rearrange the furniture, add a color. It is never about the material objects themselves, but about the spiritual ideas that are behind them. For instance, it isn't about the angle of a light bulb, but it is about creating elegance and warmth.

Likewise in prayer. In that quiet sanctuary of thought, we are actively engaged in listening. Loving the purity of God's love and the omnipotence of God's laws, we see what needs to be changed to bring thought in line with the perfect principle of God and man. In dropping whatever is unGodlike, we reveal (unwrap or expose) who we are as a child of God - that unique combination of spiritual qualities that we reflect from God.

Prayer brings healing. Healing is a revealing of what already is. So it is not about walking or not walking - it is about movement. It is not about the light bulb - it is about light. It is not about the material thing - but the spiritual substance. The spiritual substance is what determines the outward and actual.

Prayer is transformational. It moves us from one position "to one providing more opportunity for effective use."

We would no more accept our prayer time to be dull than we would accept living in a beige room with mass produced cubes for furniture. This would be like accepting prayer to simply be "stereotyped borrowed speeches."

Prayer isn't beige. Prayer is desire. And prayer in Christian Science is aflame with divine Love.
Just as an artist goes from a blank canvas to one full of color, a blacksmith goes from a steel rod to a sculpture, a designer takes a mediocre home to a home of color and grace, so can we give our consent to prayer and we can expect our prayers to transform us.





To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

The time for thinkers has come

Spiritual resource to share: intelligence

I felt a sigh of relief after I finished watching Frontline's program "The Choice 2008" that gave in-depth biographies of Obama and McCain last night. There was something about its attempt to be fair and to draw out the essential leadership qualities of the two candidates that appealed to me. As a viewer, I felt I was being recognized as a thinker, as someone who could think for herself and weigh the larger issues of today against each candidate.

Actually, I am for just about anything that appeals to our higher sense of intelligence, morals, compassion and responsibility. I get concerned when the lower sense of revenge, slander, pride and fear gets more play, not only in campaign ads, but all sorts of vehicles that attempt to influence thought.

I regularly read headlines from numerous sources (yes I can name them all if asked!) and dig into those headlines' articles based on my interest and need to know. But my favorite news source is The Christian Science Monitor. Founded by Mary Baker Eddy, who wrote "The time for thinkers has come", this newspaper has as its motto: "to injure no man, but to bless all mankind."

After watching Frontline whose approach to the program approximated this motto, I wondered if the Monitor's motto could be a standard for all media - even for all forms of information exchange!

Think of it - newspapers vetting their articles to ensure that they "injure no man, but to bless all mankind!"; Newscasters highlighting news that follows this theme; Campaign ads to adopt this standard!!

This might be interesting. As you know, the future of newspapers is being discussed. Last month, The Boston Globe ran an article "Monitoring the future of newspapers" by Alex Beam

"One place where the future remains unevenly distributed is the newspaper business. The country's most successful dailies are enduring draconian cutbacks in personnel and coverage. Some of the also-rans are disappearing altogether. What no one knows is: What will the newspaper of the future look like? Maybe it will look like The Christian Science Monitor."

Hmmm.... much to think about. I openly welcome this discussion and am looking forward to engage the best of what we can be to the urgent demands of today.

"The time for thinkers has come." Enough said.



Of special note:

The Future of Journalism
The arrival of the digital age has upended journalism. Old business models are broken. Newspapers are reeling. But we’re convinced there is a solution.
Hosted by: The Christian Science Monitor
When: Thursday, November 6 from 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm










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a look at money - revised and revisited

Spiritual resource to share: circulation of progressive ideas

Throughout my life, I have come to situations where the threat of lack of funds needed to be met: going to college, starting out on my own and in raising a family. Each time it looked like I might come up short, I turned to prayer and my needs were met.

One idea that I kept working with was from MBEddy's Miscellaneous Writings:

God gives you His spiritual ideas, and in turn, they give you daily supplies. Never ask for tomorrow: it is enough that divine Love is an ever-present help; and if you wait, never doubting, you will have all you need every moment.
What a glorious inheritance is given to us through the understanding of omnipresent Love! More we cannot ask: more we do not want: more we cannot have. This sweet assurance is the "Peace, be still" to all human fears, to suffering of every sort.

What hope this instills. Even more hope-full, it leads to practical and satisfying results. When the stock market is looking critical, and credit reports dismal, housing market in crisis, there is another report. God, as omnipotent good, reports a balance and steady flow of productive, progressive ideas. The fresh circulation of ideas is never interrupted by fear, speculation, manipulation or ignorance.

When I run up against the idea of lack, I have been able to respond in a way that I not only have what I need, but usually it is done in a surprising and totally satisfying way. Here is what I have learned along the way about demonstrating supply:

• Value every idea that comes to you
• Trust the provision and abundance of God's love -- Love also includes nourishment, harmony and balance, contentment and satisfaction
• Be grateful -- and you will see just how rich you truly are
• Discipline your wants -- Know where your desires come from and where they are leading you
• Clarify your needs
• Square each of your accounts/debts
• Be honorable and honest -- Honesty is spiritual power and integrity is "more valuable than riches"
• Be generous
• Don't be afraid -- act on behalf of the ideas and inspiration you are receiving
• Trust the provision and abundance of God's love -- Worth mentioning twice.

Truly we have a glorious inheritance! We can move forward knowing that God, Love is always supplying the ideas that, when acted on, are meeting our needs.






To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

prayer signposts among the financial crises

Spiritual resource to share: targeted prayer

we're all in this together

This just in -

News Alert 1:34 p.m. ET Friday, October 3, 2008 U.S. House Passes Financial Rescue Legislation

By a vote of 263 to 171, the House of Representatives has approved a $700 billion bailout plan in the hopes of propping up the nation's economy, which has been besieged by the fallout from the subprime mortgage crisis.

Cruising the news on the financial situation, some words and phrases keep popping up -- standing out almost highlighted, saying - this is where you need to pray! Here are some of those highlighted words (and thanks to the friends who continue to circulate articles, posts and videos on these issues that give me these words!!):

Confidence
Connection
Exchange
Let love, not fear, rule

Thomas Friedman from NYTimes distilled the financial crisis problem down to two key areas that I have decided to take up in prayer: confidence and the need to realize that we are all connected. It is the distrust and fear that is stagnating and blocking the flow of the exchange of value. And, he pointed out, we cannot get away from the fact that we are all connected. So when we set up policies that hurt others, we are hurt; when we set policies to bless and help others, we are helped.

From the UK's Evening Standard came another helpful direction for prayer: Hank Paulson practices this precept from his religion – “… a religion in which you emphasize love rather than fear," he says.

Contrast that with a recent interview overheard on public radio with a psychiatrist. He suggested that people find great reward in revenge, and so, as a way to cure this crisis, economic policy should in some way cater to this need for revenge and find a way to craft in punishments that others can give. This was not a restorative justice approach to the problem, but more of “an eye for an eye” approach. I winced. Nothing like solving a problem at the same level at which it developed. I think we are capable of a far more noble approach. And that noble approach is love.

So what are we dealing with here? This all adds up to a demand to practice the Golden Rule; to let Love govern instead of fear; open thought to possibilities.

“It is well to be calm in sickness; to be hopeful is still better; “ writes Mary Baker Eddy in her classic book: Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures. “Knowledge that we can accomplish the good we hope for, stimulates the system to act in the direction which Mind points out.”

We can take the steps to remove the distrust and fear, envy, malice and greed from the problem and from the solution. We can step up to the demand to have confidence in Truth (all that is fair, just, reasonable, balanced) instead of chaos. We can emphasize love instead of fear, and make the Golden Rule* our basis for interactions.

We are all in this together. And today's step will continue to draw out of us all the intelligence, justice, honesty, compassion and nobility that God has given us.

(Recommended: Check out Karen Armstrong's talk on ted.com and her efforts to build a Charter for Compassion -- to help restore the Golden Rule as the central global religious doctrine. )


To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

Rise up!

Spiritual resource to share: a higher hope

Hope. Change. Freedom. It is not surprising in an election year how powerful these words are……and how often they are used.

But these words can be used to generate fear and division and ridicule as much as they bring out the most cherished human ideals. So how to sort through the emotions on the human scene in this campaign season in the US - full of news headlines of division and lack and fear?

We rise up - letting our thought rise to the level of what is spiritual. Then we see that there is a spiritual basis for hope, for change and for freedom.

MBEddy writes under the heading of “Higher hope:”

The human mind will sometime rise above all material and physical sense, exchanging it for spiritual perception, and exchanging human concepts for the divine consciousness. Then man will recognize his God-given dominion and being.

Check out this article that explains more about a spiritual basis for hope in "The power of resurrection brings hope" from spirituality.com.






To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

now let's just take a moment.........

Spiritual resource to share: stillness

I'd like to take a moment from the raging headlines today and write about moments and why it is hard to catch and keep them.

I'm remembering the time when my exchange student daughter and I visited her high school for the last time before she flew back home. "Wait," she said as she ran around the school taking pictures of her old classrooms, the hallways, her old locker. She took as many pictures as her camera would hold.

Like my son, who told me to wait as we drove off to the airport to see him off for Germany. And so I slowed down and made stops along the way as he took in a long look at our house, the well traveled roads that he walked, ran and biked, the cinema, the restaurant where he worked, as he wouldn't be seeing these again for a whole year.

I can relate. Tons of times I have wanted to capture a moment that I could take out and swim in again and again. But life is rich. It is full of moments and they just keep coming.

So what is in a moment and what makes it memorable? More than a place or a thing – a memorable moment tells us all of what is spiritually rich about our lives.

One of my favorite poets is Godfrey John who has this spiritual take on ‘moments’ in his poem:

“This Moment of Your Living”

You’re alive – not merely existing. You are: you’re not trying to be. Discover the life of the moment- this moment of your living.

NOT YOU
Not you – as an amalgam of happenings, you-as-you-were a decade, a moment, ago: to ask What was I? is to be blind to the fact of presence. Man is not a chronology. Not you as a mosaic of hopes and fears: to ask What will I be? Is to stop discovering. Not you content with a status quo: a cup of years spilling satisfaction over the hour. Not even you-as-you-becoming --

BUT YOU BEING
You spiritually. You in the action of being you where being is the emanation of I AM. “I AM hath sent me unto you”: Being, God, impels man, breathes through him Love’s incentives. Soul’s expression now, you go as His fragrance in every place.
This is your felt unity with Him. Moment by moment.
Soul plants pure desires along your days. The innocence of what you are flares through the guilt of what you are not. Like cyclamen in the winter sun: not withholding, not seeking to hold- but giving out help simply by being what it is- moment by moment.

YOU TIMELESSLY
Not you in the moment. But this moment of you-- brilliantly, immaculately. Knowing is being. Infinitely. Mind’s allness, Mind’s oneness never stops being known. As man-idea, woman-idea--one idea-- in God’s thought, you are instantly
understood, always being known; you have Soul’s mobility within this hourless
knowing: the dance fulfilling the dancer without end, as in beauty in the unspoken, as rhythm in what is till.

DISCONVERING
To ask Who am I? is to be irrelevant. To ask What am I? is to be blind to substance, to the isness of Spirit where you are.
Ask, How am I being?
Man is what he’s being-- Love’s pure idea-- birthlessly real.
Love’s meaning is your meaning at each moment of new awakening- at the precision –timing of Principle. Here you are learning to be what you are.
Beautifully. Brilliantly. Preciously. Agelessly. Mightily. Deathlessly. Yes, as a psalm spills over you. Yes, in this fond discovering of you. You are what you are because I AM that I AM. NOW.
Moment by moment by moment by moment

copyright 1978 Christian Science Publishing Society
from book Idea on Wings

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"American Prayer"

Spiritual resource to share: noble deeds



There are some actions taken - like this music video - that so effectively touch the heart, that the differences in race, age, orientation, education, party afiliation and gender fade in a united effort to hope, to pray and to become those actors of noble things.

These days, and this age is demanding from us our nobility. My prayer is that we remember that we are the children of God, "the noblest work of God" sings a hymn. We can do noble things.

American Prayer - Dave Stewart (Barack Obama Music Video)
Source: www.youtube.com









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Our Father-Mother God

Spiritual resource to share: the motherhood of God

An unlikely picture for this post? Maybe, but I love the fatherly and motherly qualities expressed by this dog!

Our local paper has a regular column called “Faith and Values” written by our area’s spiritual leadership. My friend Erin, a Methodist youth minister and new mother, wrote the most recent article last week with the title: “Our Mother who art in heaven.” In it, she asks a few questions:

“…why don’t we teach them (all kids) the concept of a heavenly Mother? As a woman, I was created in God’s image, right? I don’t think God can be limited by our lack of understanding, but do we limit ourselves with our partial concept of God? Sometimes I need my Dad. Sometimes I need my Mom. Can’t God be both?”

Oh yeah. I think I love this question because I love the answer even more. I firmly believe that God is both our Father and our Mother.

With the Biblical premise that Erin brings out – if we are made in the image and likeness of God, who created male and female, then fathering AND mothering must be divine. To me, it's logical that God is our Father as well as Mother.

What other Biblical evidence do we have?

• “God is Love.” That’s from the book of John.
• “The Lord is my Shepherd." The 23^rd Psalm explains the motherhood of God thoroughly.
• And from another Psalms, Psalms 91: “ I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress...He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust”

Mary Baker Eddy brought out the idea of God as Father-Mother in her spiritual perspective of The Lord's Prayer. She also writes:

The ideal man corresponds to creation, to intelligence, and to Truth. The ideal woman corresponds to Life and to Love. In divine Science, we have not as much authority for considering God masculine, as we have for considering Him feminine, for Love imparts the clearest idea of Deity.

In my own experience, I have been comforted and healed by feeling the gentle, loving presence of an all-loving God, guiding me so many times: when my family made a series of moves across the country; when I have been healed of resentment and anxiety, of physical ailments, and much more. I have felt companioned and encouraged when I thought I was all alone. God's mothering qualities and gentle presence of peace and approval has strengthened me more than my many blog posts can ever tell!

I have leaned on the idea that I am the image and likeness of my Father – Mother God as a parent. It has helped me see that the source of my mothering is God. The idea of a mother’s love being spiritual is powerful:

A mother's affection cannot be weaned from her child, because the mother-love includes purity and constancy, both of which are immortal. Therefore maternal affection lives on under whatever difficulties.

Sometimes I have needed the strength and protection of a father, other times I have needed the unconditional love and comfort of a mother. I am so glad to know that God is both!

To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.