Weekly Recap for Tuesday, May 10, 2016 from ProgressiveChristianity.org in Gig Harbor, Washington, United States - Is there ever a time it is OK to use the n-word? This and more in our Free Weekly Recap of our most viewed and new resources from last week.
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Allies for Atheists: Why and How?
Jim Burklo
In the US, now is a better time to be an atheist than ever. A serious candidate for the presidency has declared on national television that he does not believe in God. The percentage of declared atheists and religiously unaffiliated people in America has risen substantially in recent years. To lack or reject religion is becoming considerably more socially acceptable.
That’s why the non-religious, and avowed atheists in particular, need theistic allies to defend them, more than ever.
This seeming paradox is resolved by considering the strong reaction by some conservative religious people against this more tolerant social milieu. They interpret the social acceptability of atheism or agnosticism as an attack on their religion. They equate their loss of cultural dominance as an erosion of their religious freedom.
In fact, the liberty to practice one’s religion is not the same thing as expecting others to give it extra social or legal privilege. But this is lost on many folks in the religious right. In contradiction to the Constitution, they are pressing for the Bible to be designated the State Book of Tennessee. They are pressing state legislatures to pass laws to allow them to discriminate against people who don’t follow their doctrinal definitions of morality. They are fighting to defend themselves in a “war against religion” that exists only in their fevered imaginations. Really, it is their war against people outside of their fold: atheists, agnostics, irreligious people, gays, lesbians, the transgendered, members of minority religions… and progressive religious people.
We didn’t pick this fight. But we’re in it. In our progressive churches and temples are gay and lesbian and transgendered people whom we accept and include fully. We perform same-sex marriages. Wedding cakes for gay and lesbian couples get cut in our social halls. So it matters to us when our couples can’t get those cakes, or otherwise are treated as second-class citizens. Evangelical culture warriors used to write off progressive Christians as a numerically insignificant crew of heretics. But that is changing as evangelical churches are shrinking. Folks in the religious right are beginning to define us as a force to be reckoned with.
Then there is the constant misunderstanding we get from people who assume that all Christians must be homophobic, bigoted, dogmatic, and self-righteous. The religious right has given all of Christianity a bad name. It’s a constant challenge to correct people’s perceptions. Giving Christianity inappropriate legal and social privilege is counterproductive for all our churches.
So atheists and progressive Christians have important reasons to engage and cooperate. Our progressive churches include many atheist members, and even some atheist clergy. It is in the very DNA of progressive Christianity to be open, affirming, and inclusive toward atheists. But a lot of progressive Christians fail to include atheists in their interfaith conversations. And a lot of atheists don’t know that or who we are.
I’ve had many conversations with atheists in which I ask them what God they don’t believe in. The answer is always the same: they don’t believe in a supernatural, Guy-In-The-Sky God. I tell them I don’t believe in that God, either. Then some of them get upset, even angry, because I don’t fit their stereotype of a Christian. Nobody told them that there are Christians who believe that God is love, that God is one with nature, that God is not on top of everything, but rather is in everything. I’ve had atheists get frustrated at me because I don’t think they are going to hell!
But our fates, our faith and non-faith, are intertwined. After all, the early Christians were harassed for being atheists. They worshiped a divinity that could not be idolized, unlike every other god in the Greco-Roman world at the time. The same accusation is leveled at progressive Christians by conservative Christians, who often assume that if we don’t believe in their supernatural God, we can’t claim to believe in God at all.
Progressive religious people need to go public about who we are and who we are not, in crisp, clear terms. Otherwise, we’ll be continue to be lumped together in the public’s mind with right-wing culture warriors who claim to speak for all Christians. And likewise we are called to take public stands in support of our atheist, agnostic, and irreligious friends, not just because we’re in this mess together, but also because our faith teaches us that it is the right thing to do.
It starts with conversations that lead to understanding each other. Some folks who are public about their atheism were burned by bad religion. Those of us who have had mostly positive experiences with our religion need to understand the depths of the pain these people have suffered, in order to appreciate the stand they now take. Likewise, atheists who have turned away from religion, or against it, would do well to learn that there are many religious people who do not judge them as evil, misguided, and damned. They need to meet religious allies who will love them as neighbors as they would love themselves.
Our job as progressive religious allies is to normalize the public discourse about atheism. That starts with directly addressing the most common misconception: that you can’t be a moral, ethical person without being a Christian or at least believing in God. But religious pluralism is central to progressive Christianity. We believe there is not just one way to live a good life and engage with Ultimate Reality. Our way is one good way, but there are others. We need to include atheism among them. Certainly religion is an underpinning for morality. But morality has even deeper roots. It is hard-wired into human consciousness. Progressive Christians celebrate this fact. It’s good news for humanity, not bad news for religion! Our faith encourages the “original blessing” of our best biologically-driven tendencies toward compassion and justice. Atheists can be our allies in striving to live rightly and well in community.
As atheists come out of the closet, they are creating new public institutions, and progressive Christians ought to support them in the process. “Sunday Assemblies” are communities that gather for social interaction and support in cities around the world. They are a lot like churches in that they meet on Sunday mornings for inspirational talks and music followed by “coffee hour”. They grew out of atheist groups, but now include all sorts of people who may or may not identify as atheists, but have a common desire to be part of an ongoing, local community that serves its neighborhood. Progressive churches are ideally situated to work with non-religious folks to create similar kinds of communities. In San Mateo, CA, I organized one through the church I served as a pastor. Monthly, we held an event in our church building which brought in authors, speakers, and musicians. It had no religious content in any traditional sense. It attracted a steady crowd of people who would never come to a religious worship service, but wanted to be part of an ongoing community. Some of them were atheists, some were just disinterested in organized religion. Some of our church members attended these events, as well. We had no agenda to “save” or “convert” people to our tradition by bringing them into our building. Our progressive churches have the facilities, the leadership, the organizational structure, and most importantly the open, non-dogmatic attitude needed to establish secular communities in our neighborhoods. We get it that everybody needs community, but not everybody wants religion in order to have it. We can get such groups started and “spin them off” when they are self-supporting, or we can create such communities and maintain them under our organizational umbrellas. We can create these groups as building-blocks for revitalizing democracy at the grass-roots level, engines for increasing citizen engagement with public issues.
We’re all in trouble if our atheist, agnostic, and irreligious neighbors suffer discrimination on the basis of their non-belief. If you can be hassled for atheism, then you can be harassed for doctrinal deviation within Christianity or other faiths. Freedom of religion means nothing without freedom to have no religion.
[JIM BURKLO
Website: JIMBURKLO.COM Weblog: MUSINGS Follow me on twitter: @jtburklo
See the GUIDE to my articles and books
Associate Dean of Religious Life, University of Southern California]
In the US, now is a better time to be an atheist than ever. A serious candidate for the presidency has declared on national television that he does not believe in God. The percentage of declared atheists and religiously unaffiliated people in America has risen substantially in recent years. To lack or reject religion is becoming considerably more socially acceptable.
That’s why the non-religious, and avowed atheists in particular, need theistic allies to defend them, more than ever.
This seeming paradox is resolved by considering the strong reaction by some conservative religious people against this more tolerant social milieu. They interpret the social acceptability of atheism or agnosticism as an attack on their religion. They equate their loss of cultural dominance as an erosion of their religious freedom.
In fact, the liberty to practice one’s religion is not the same thing as expecting others to give it extra social or legal privilege. But this is lost on many folks in the religious right. In contradiction to the Constitution, they are pressing for the Bible to be designated the State Book of Tennessee. They are pressing state legislatures to pass laws to allow them to discriminate against people who don’t follow their doctrinal definitions of morality. They are fighting to defend themselves in a “war against religion” that exists only in their fevered imaginations. Really, it is their war against people outside of their fold: atheists, agnostics, irreligious people, gays, lesbians, the transgendered, members of minority religions… and progressive religious people.
We didn’t pick this fight. But we’re in it. In our progressive churches and temples are gay and lesbian and transgendered people whom we accept and include fully. We perform same-sex marriages. Wedding cakes for gay and lesbian couples get cut in our social halls. So it matters to us when our couples can’t get those cakes, or otherwise are treated as second-class citizens. Evangelical culture warriors used to write off progressive Christians as a numerically insignificant crew of heretics. But that is changing as evangelical churches are shrinking. Folks in the religious right are beginning to define us as a force to be reckoned with.
Then there is the constant misunderstanding we get from people who assume that all Christians must be homophobic, bigoted, dogmatic, and self-righteous. The religious right has given all of Christianity a bad name. It’s a constant challenge to correct people’s perceptions. Giving Christianity inappropriate legal and social privilege is counterproductive for all our churches.
So atheists and progressive Christians have important reasons to engage and cooperate. Our progressive churches include many atheist members, and even some atheist clergy. It is in the very DNA of progressive Christianity to be open, affirming, and inclusive toward atheists. But a lot of progressive Christians fail to include atheists in their interfaith conversations. And a lot of atheists don’t know that or who we are.
I’ve had many conversations with atheists in which I ask them what God they don’t believe in. The answer is always the same: they don’t believe in a supernatural, Guy-In-The-Sky God. I tell them I don’t believe in that God, either. Then some of them get upset, even angry, because I don’t fit their stereotype of a Christian. Nobody told them that there are Christians who believe that God is love, that God is one with nature, that God is not on top of everything, but rather is in everything. I’ve had atheists get frustrated at me because I don’t think they are going to hell!
But our fates, our faith and non-faith, are intertwined. After all, the early Christians were harassed for being atheists. They worshiped a divinity that could not be idolized, unlike every other god in the Greco-Roman world at the time. The same accusation is leveled at progressive Christians by conservative Christians, who often assume that if we don’t believe in their supernatural God, we can’t claim to believe in God at all.
Progressive religious people need to go public about who we are and who we are not, in crisp, clear terms. Otherwise, we’ll be continue to be lumped together in the public’s mind with right-wing culture warriors who claim to speak for all Christians. And likewise we are called to take public stands in support of our atheist, agnostic, and irreligious friends, not just because we’re in this mess together, but also because our faith teaches us that it is the right thing to do.
It starts with conversations that lead to understanding each other. Some folks who are public about their atheism were burned by bad religion. Those of us who have had mostly positive experiences with our religion need to understand the depths of the pain these people have suffered, in order to appreciate the stand they now take. Likewise, atheists who have turned away from religion, or against it, would do well to learn that there are many religious people who do not judge them as evil, misguided, and damned. They need to meet religious allies who will love them as neighbors as they would love themselves.
Our job as progressive religious allies is to normalize the public discourse about atheism. That starts with directly addressing the most common misconception: that you can’t be a moral, ethical person without being a Christian or at least believing in God. But religious pluralism is central to progressive Christianity. We believe there is not just one way to live a good life and engage with Ultimate Reality. Our way is one good way, but there are others. We need to include atheism among them. Certainly religion is an underpinning for morality. But morality has even deeper roots. It is hard-wired into human consciousness. Progressive Christians celebrate this fact. It’s good news for humanity, not bad news for religion! Our faith encourages the “original blessing” of our best biologically-driven tendencies toward compassion and justice. Atheists can be our allies in striving to live rightly and well in community.
As atheists come out of the closet, they are creating new public institutions, and progressive Christians ought to support them in the process. “Sunday Assemblies” are communities that gather for social interaction and support in cities around the world. They are a lot like churches in that they meet on Sunday mornings for inspirational talks and music followed by “coffee hour”. They grew out of atheist groups, but now include all sorts of people who may or may not identify as atheists, but have a common desire to be part of an ongoing, local community that serves its neighborhood. Progressive churches are ideally situated to work with non-religious folks to create similar kinds of communities. In San Mateo, CA, I organized one through the church I served as a pastor. Monthly, we held an event in our church building which brought in authors, speakers, and musicians. It had no religious content in any traditional sense. It attracted a steady crowd of people who would never come to a religious worship service, but wanted to be part of an ongoing community. Some of them were atheists, some were just disinterested in organized religion. Some of our church members attended these events, as well. We had no agenda to “save” or “convert” people to our tradition by bringing them into our building. Our progressive churches have the facilities, the leadership, the organizational structure, and most importantly the open, non-dogmatic attitude needed to establish secular communities in our neighborhoods. We get it that everybody needs community, but not everybody wants religion in order to have it. We can get such groups started and “spin them off” when they are self-supporting, or we can create such communities and maintain them under our organizational umbrellas. We can create these groups as building-blocks for revitalizing democracy at the grass-roots level, engines for increasing citizen engagement with public issues.
We’re all in trouble if our atheist, agnostic, and irreligious neighbors suffer discrimination on the basis of their non-belief. If you can be hassled for atheism, then you can be harassed for doctrinal deviation within Christianity or other faiths. Freedom of religion means nothing without freedom to have no religion.
[JIM BURKLO
Website: JIMBURKLO.COM Weblog: MUSINGS Follow me on twitter: @jtburklo
See the GUIDE to my articles and books
Associate Dean of Religious Life, University of Southern California]
READ ON ...
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Practicing Resurrection: Sophia/Wisdom – A Sermon for Mothers’ Day
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Practicing Resurrection: Sophia/Wisdom – A Sermon for Mothers’ Day
Rev. Dawn Hutchings
The sermon hymn: “When Masks of God Both Age and Die” can be found Here. Listen to the Mothers’ Day Sermon Here.
El Shaddai, Eloheim, Rauach, Chokma, Rechem, YAHWEH, these are the ancient biblical Hebrew names for the reality that we call God. El Shaddai which translates as “she – breasted one, ”Eloheim which is the feminine plural for “majesty,” Rauach a feminine word for “wind” “breath” “spirit,” Chokma, a feminine word for “wisdom.” Rechem also a feminine word which translates as “ womb love” mother love, compassion. YAHWEH – I AM, WHO AM or I shall be who I shall be Ancient biblical Hebrew names for the reality that we call God.
During the time of Jesus there was another name for God that was used by the Jewish people: El Shekinah which translates as “she who dwells among us.” There were other words for the reality that we call God which the writers of the New Testament would have been so familiar with; Greek words like: Theos — a feminine noun which translates simply as “God,” Sophia – which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew word Rauach for “Wisdom,” Pnumena – the feminine noun which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew word Chokma which means: wind, breath or spirit. That these names for the reality that we call God are all feminine nouns is remarkable when you look at how these words were translated by the Roman Empire into Latin: Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Stripped of her breasts and her womb-love, the One we call God, the Chokma who Dwells among us, is given the aura of a powerful young Roman God as the word for breasts is translated as “Almighty” and whose Rechem – womb-love is reserved for those who fear HIM.
Yet despite the Empire’s attempt to penetrate the sacred feminine with masculinity’s youthful vigor, (yes, I did mean that pun) this reality we call God will age over the centuries to become a bearded old grandfather-like figure who lives up there somewhere, and woe to those who dare to expose His transgendered history; for God is male and that’s that. The image of the great I AM erected by the male hierarchy to be worshipped and glorified, forever and ever, as Father, Son, and yes, even the nebulous Holy Spirit becomes HE in order to penetrate His Bride the church. No room for talk of breasts or womb as SHE who dwells among us, Chokma, Sophia, Wisdom is banished to the mists of time. That is until women began to be admitted to the sacred halls of the academy; until women began in significant numbers to study the ancient texts and unravel the ancient languages and begin to question the work of their male predecessors and contemporaries. Female academics, female theologians, and female translators’ questions lead to the discover of the long hidden, often denied, and ever present breasts and womb which now that they have been exposed will never again be cast out from their dwelling place among us. Wisdom, Sophia has been emancipated she is woman hear her roar.
OK, now that I’ve gotten that out, now that I’ve risked being labeled an angry feminist, let me assure you that I am indeed an angry feminist; a title I wear with pride. For who wouldn’t be angry at the remembrance of all that was lost over the centuries; centuries which saw both women and men robed of the sacred feminine which was stripped from the image of we created of the reality that we call God. Those of you who have been around here for previous Mother’s day sermons may have grown weary of my point out that the word which our English translations of the book of Proverbs translates as wisdom, comes from the feminine Hebrew word Chokma which when it was translated into Greek becomes Sophia. Some of you will remember that the oldest Greek manuscripts we have were written in capitol letters without spaces between the words. So that the male translators would have had reason not to read Sophia as a proper name; especially as the context in which it occurred clearly indicated that she was a personification of wisdom. So, wherever we see wisdom without a capital we can substitute the name Sophia with a capitol so that it is clear that the writer of the Book of Proverbs was personifying wisdom as a woman and that this Sophia was a feminine attribute of God. Choma – Wisdom – Sophia would later become among some of the followers of Jesus an attribute of the risen Christ so that even the writer of the Gospels of Luke and John sing her praises, as does the Apostle Paul.
Sophia-Wisdom personifies all that is feminine in the image our ancient ancestors used to personify the reality that we call God. But like all personifications Sophia-Wisdom ultimately fails to capture all that is God – YAHWEH will despite all our best attempts to cast YAHWEH in images, YAHWEH will be who YAHWEH will be neither male nor female, beyond gender, beyond our definitions, beyond our images, beyond the beyond and beyond that also.
Is it any wonder that so many people have moved beyond our various images of divinity? For too long now we have offered up various personifications of that which we call God and said, here worship this the LORD your God, Father of Heaven and Earth, Almighty, Everlasting, Omniscient, Omnipresent, Creator, Redeemer, Sanctifier, Father, Mother, Lover, Friend, Companion, Judge, source of our Salvation, Mighty King, Gracious Lord, Sophia, El Shaddai, Eternal, Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise.
I could go on and on about the various personifications of divinity and none of them, not a single one of them will suffice when it comes to describing that which lies at the very heart of reality, the idea which we call God. For so many people today, the failures our personifications to capture the reality of this thing we call God has lead to the denial of God’s existence. For too long now, we have looked to our various personifications as if they actually are God. But whether we believe in God or not, that does not mean that whatever it IS that lies at the heart of reality this thing that we look to personifications to help us comprehend, that this thing that we call God does not exist. We can argue all we want about what it is, but that it is is beyond us. Take Mother Nature for example. How many people believe that Mother Nature actually exists? Mother Nature is a personification of the Earth. Mother Nature is not real. But whether or we believe in Mother Nature, the Earth still exists. Personifications are wonderful and can be so very helpful when it comes to our being able to relate to something that is so vast our minds cannot begin to fathom. The Earth’s immensity and complexity is more than we can comprehend, and yet we interact with Mother Nature each and every day in ways that we all can understand. We can rejoice in her blessings and we can fear her wrath. We can also be moved to great compassion when Mother Nature is abused, neglected, wounded, damaged or threatened with extinction, or ultimate destruction. Whether we believe in Mother Nature or not, the Earth is real. Whether we believe in the various personifications of that which lies at the heart of all that is and yet is beyond the beyond and beyond that also, the reality that we call God still exists.
We may not be able to name it, or define it, or even relate to it, but it IS and just like Mother Nature, there are aspects of this ISNESS that we can know. Our knowing the ISNESS that IS God has been both helped and hindered by our personifications. Our knowing the ISNESS that IS God has also been both helped and hindered by our sacred scriptures. For centuries we in the West have pointed to the Bible as the ultimate source of information about this ISNESS that IS God. But the reality that IS God, cannot be contained in any book. Indeed, centuries ago, Sir Francis Bacon reminded us that God wrote two books, not just one. The first book was the Bible and the second book is creation. I would go a lot further than Sir Francis and insist that this ISNESS that IS God wrote billions of books among them the Bible, the Quran, the Upanishads, the Gitas, indeed the sacred scriptures of all those who have and do worship this ISNESS but that the most important revelation of this ISNESS has and always will be creation itself. We are learning more and more and more each and every day about the wonders of creation and this amazing cosmos in which we live and move and have our being.
For two long now, we have relied upon inadequate personifications to reveal the nature of this ISNESS and failed to see beyond our own noses to the reality that is so much more that we can begin to imagine or comprehend. Instead of making idols of our personifications we need to open ourselves to the marvelous reality that lies beyond all our notions who who and what this splendid ISISNESS is for God will be who God will be and that BEING is more than any being we can conjure up in our wildest imaginings. But just as I can know the beauty of those tulips on this glorious morning, we can also know this ISINESS. This tulip is a precious gift of Mother Nature, a gift in which I can glimpse the reality that is creation. Jesus of Nazareth was a precious gift of God in whom his sisters and brother caught a glimpse of the reality that IS God. Each one of you are precious gifts created by the Source of All life, in whom we can see glimpses of the reality that lies at the heart of all that IS. All of creation is telling the glory of God, for as Carl Sagan insisted, science is “informed worship.” Science is a source of revelation as we continue to explore the depths and wonders of the cosmos and beyond the beyond and beyond that also. Poetry, art, literature, beauty, humanity in all its splendor and vulnerability are revelations of the reality that lies at the very heart of all that is. And so, we will continue to personify this reality that is beyond our ability to comprehend, articulate, or capture and our personifications will function as revelations as long as we remember that they are not real but merely our attempts to relate to a reality that is beyond the beyond and beyond that also. This is the wisdom of the ages. Sophia who dances in, with, through, and among us, El Shekniah, the Breasted ONE, El Shaddai whose womb-love, Rechem, is the source of all LOVE, the enabler of our Rauach, Breath, the Spirit who lives in with through and beyond us, now and always, the One in whom we live and move and have our being, the reality that we call God, who is was and ever shall be: Beyond the Beyond and Beyond that also, our Lover, Beloved, and LOVE itself! So, let us continue to be revelations of that reality by embodying LOVE in the world.
[Visit Rev. Dawn Hutchings Website Here]
READ ON ...
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Obama’s send-off at last White House correspondents’ dinner ends with the n-word…Irene Monroe
The sermon hymn: “When Masks of God Both Age and Die” can be found Here. Listen to the Mothers’ Day Sermon Here.
El Shaddai, Eloheim, Rauach, Chokma, Rechem, YAHWEH, these are the ancient biblical Hebrew names for the reality that we call God. El Shaddai which translates as “she – breasted one, ”Eloheim which is the feminine plural for “majesty,” Rauach a feminine word for “wind” “breath” “spirit,” Chokma, a feminine word for “wisdom.” Rechem also a feminine word which translates as “ womb love” mother love, compassion. YAHWEH – I AM, WHO AM or I shall be who I shall be Ancient biblical Hebrew names for the reality that we call God.
During the time of Jesus there was another name for God that was used by the Jewish people: El Shekinah which translates as “she who dwells among us.” There were other words for the reality that we call God which the writers of the New Testament would have been so familiar with; Greek words like: Theos — a feminine noun which translates simply as “God,” Sophia – which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew word Rauach for “Wisdom,” Pnumena – the feminine noun which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew word Chokma which means: wind, breath or spirit. That these names for the reality that we call God are all feminine nouns is remarkable when you look at how these words were translated by the Roman Empire into Latin: Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Stripped of her breasts and her womb-love, the One we call God, the Chokma who Dwells among us, is given the aura of a powerful young Roman God as the word for breasts is translated as “Almighty” and whose Rechem – womb-love is reserved for those who fear HIM.
Yet despite the Empire’s attempt to penetrate the sacred feminine with masculinity’s youthful vigor, (yes, I did mean that pun) this reality we call God will age over the centuries to become a bearded old grandfather-like figure who lives up there somewhere, and woe to those who dare to expose His transgendered history; for God is male and that’s that. The image of the great I AM erected by the male hierarchy to be worshipped and glorified, forever and ever, as Father, Son, and yes, even the nebulous Holy Spirit becomes HE in order to penetrate His Bride the church. No room for talk of breasts or womb as SHE who dwells among us, Chokma, Sophia, Wisdom is banished to the mists of time. That is until women began to be admitted to the sacred halls of the academy; until women began in significant numbers to study the ancient texts and unravel the ancient languages and begin to question the work of their male predecessors and contemporaries. Female academics, female theologians, and female translators’ questions lead to the discover of the long hidden, often denied, and ever present breasts and womb which now that they have been exposed will never again be cast out from their dwelling place among us. Wisdom, Sophia has been emancipated she is woman hear her roar.
OK, now that I’ve gotten that out, now that I’ve risked being labeled an angry feminist, let me assure you that I am indeed an angry feminist; a title I wear with pride. For who wouldn’t be angry at the remembrance of all that was lost over the centuries; centuries which saw both women and men robed of the sacred feminine which was stripped from the image of we created of the reality that we call God. Those of you who have been around here for previous Mother’s day sermons may have grown weary of my point out that the word which our English translations of the book of Proverbs translates as wisdom, comes from the feminine Hebrew word Chokma which when it was translated into Greek becomes Sophia. Some of you will remember that the oldest Greek manuscripts we have were written in capitol letters without spaces between the words. So that the male translators would have had reason not to read Sophia as a proper name; especially as the context in which it occurred clearly indicated that she was a personification of wisdom. So, wherever we see wisdom without a capital we can substitute the name Sophia with a capitol so that it is clear that the writer of the Book of Proverbs was personifying wisdom as a woman and that this Sophia was a feminine attribute of God. Choma – Wisdom – Sophia would later become among some of the followers of Jesus an attribute of the risen Christ so that even the writer of the Gospels of Luke and John sing her praises, as does the Apostle Paul.
Sophia-Wisdom personifies all that is feminine in the image our ancient ancestors used to personify the reality that we call God. But like all personifications Sophia-Wisdom ultimately fails to capture all that is God – YAHWEH will despite all our best attempts to cast YAHWEH in images, YAHWEH will be who YAHWEH will be neither male nor female, beyond gender, beyond our definitions, beyond our images, beyond the beyond and beyond that also.
Is it any wonder that so many people have moved beyond our various images of divinity? For too long now we have offered up various personifications of that which we call God and said, here worship this the LORD your God, Father of Heaven and Earth, Almighty, Everlasting, Omniscient, Omnipresent, Creator, Redeemer, Sanctifier, Father, Mother, Lover, Friend, Companion, Judge, source of our Salvation, Mighty King, Gracious Lord, Sophia, El Shaddai, Eternal, Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise.
I could go on and on about the various personifications of divinity and none of them, not a single one of them will suffice when it comes to describing that which lies at the very heart of reality, the idea which we call God. For so many people today, the failures our personifications to capture the reality of this thing we call God has lead to the denial of God’s existence. For too long now, we have looked to our various personifications as if they actually are God. But whether we believe in God or not, that does not mean that whatever it IS that lies at the heart of reality this thing that we look to personifications to help us comprehend, that this thing that we call God does not exist. We can argue all we want about what it is, but that it is is beyond us. Take Mother Nature for example. How many people believe that Mother Nature actually exists? Mother Nature is a personification of the Earth. Mother Nature is not real. But whether or we believe in Mother Nature, the Earth still exists. Personifications are wonderful and can be so very helpful when it comes to our being able to relate to something that is so vast our minds cannot begin to fathom. The Earth’s immensity and complexity is more than we can comprehend, and yet we interact with Mother Nature each and every day in ways that we all can understand. We can rejoice in her blessings and we can fear her wrath. We can also be moved to great compassion when Mother Nature is abused, neglected, wounded, damaged or threatened with extinction, or ultimate destruction. Whether we believe in Mother Nature or not, the Earth is real. Whether we believe in the various personifications of that which lies at the heart of all that is and yet is beyond the beyond and beyond that also, the reality that we call God still exists.
We may not be able to name it, or define it, or even relate to it, but it IS and just like Mother Nature, there are aspects of this ISNESS that we can know. Our knowing the ISNESS that IS God has been both helped and hindered by our personifications. Our knowing the ISNESS that IS God has also been both helped and hindered by our sacred scriptures. For centuries we in the West have pointed to the Bible as the ultimate source of information about this ISNESS that IS God. But the reality that IS God, cannot be contained in any book. Indeed, centuries ago, Sir Francis Bacon reminded us that God wrote two books, not just one. The first book was the Bible and the second book is creation. I would go a lot further than Sir Francis and insist that this ISNESS that IS God wrote billions of books among them the Bible, the Quran, the Upanishads, the Gitas, indeed the sacred scriptures of all those who have and do worship this ISNESS but that the most important revelation of this ISNESS has and always will be creation itself. We are learning more and more and more each and every day about the wonders of creation and this amazing cosmos in which we live and move and have our being.
For two long now, we have relied upon inadequate personifications to reveal the nature of this ISNESS and failed to see beyond our own noses to the reality that is so much more that we can begin to imagine or comprehend. Instead of making idols of our personifications we need to open ourselves to the marvelous reality that lies beyond all our notions who who and what this splendid ISISNESS is for God will be who God will be and that BEING is more than any being we can conjure up in our wildest imaginings. But just as I can know the beauty of those tulips on this glorious morning, we can also know this ISINESS. This tulip is a precious gift of Mother Nature, a gift in which I can glimpse the reality that is creation. Jesus of Nazareth was a precious gift of God in whom his sisters and brother caught a glimpse of the reality that IS God. Each one of you are precious gifts created by the Source of All life, in whom we can see glimpses of the reality that lies at the heart of all that IS. All of creation is telling the glory of God, for as Carl Sagan insisted, science is “informed worship.” Science is a source of revelation as we continue to explore the depths and wonders of the cosmos and beyond the beyond and beyond that also. Poetry, art, literature, beauty, humanity in all its splendor and vulnerability are revelations of the reality that lies at the very heart of all that is. And so, we will continue to personify this reality that is beyond our ability to comprehend, articulate, or capture and our personifications will function as revelations as long as we remember that they are not real but merely our attempts to relate to a reality that is beyond the beyond and beyond that also. This is the wisdom of the ages. Sophia who dances in, with, through, and among us, El Shekniah, the Breasted ONE, El Shaddai whose womb-love, Rechem, is the source of all LOVE, the enabler of our Rauach, Breath, the Spirit who lives in with through and beyond us, now and always, the One in whom we live and move and have our being, the reality that we call God, who is was and ever shall be: Beyond the Beyond and Beyond that also, our Lover, Beloved, and LOVE itself! So, let us continue to be revelations of that reality by embodying LOVE in the world.
[Visit Rev. Dawn Hutchings Website Here]
READ ON ...
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Obama’s send-off at last White House correspondents’ dinner ends with the n-word…Irene Monroe
What was expected to be a friendly and light-hearted skewering of political and media elites at the White House correspondents’ dinner by Larry Wilmore, comedian and host of Comedy Central’s “The Nightly Show,” turned into a night of off-color remarks, edgy jabs where you heard moans and groans.
In his closing remarks thanking Obama for his tenure as president and the mark he has made in the world, Wilmore dropped the n-word. And at that moment you heard audible gasps and saw visible grimaces of shock, pain and embarrassment.
“When I was a kid, I lived in a country where people couldn’t accept a black quarterback,” Wilmore said. “Now think about that. A black man was thought by his mere color not good enough to lead a football team — and now, to live in your time, Mr. President, when a black man can lead the entire free world.Words alone do me no justice. So, Mr. President, if i’m going to keep it 100: Yo, Barry, you did it, my n—-. You did it.”
When Wilmore dropped the n-word twitter blew up. And what will probably be debated for a while is whether Wimore went too far. Many of the comments on twitter were asking is the n-word what the American public need to hear associated to Obama’s last months in office, especially given the racial roller coaster the entire country has been on since Obama took office and evident by the treatment of him.
Wilmore won’t be the last African American comedian to use the epithet in public discourse. But how it’s used means everything.
For example, last year when news broke that President Obama used the n-word during the podcast interview “WFT with Marc Maron” about America’s racial history, it caused shock waves. We are shocked because we are all confused as to when — if ever — there is an appropriate context to use the word.
On CNN, legal analyst Sunny Hostin said that Obama’s use of the word was inappropriate because of his office, and given the history of the word itself. New York Times columnist Charles Blow countered Hostin’s assertion, pointing out that Obama used the word correctly: as a teaching moment.
The confusion illustrates what happens when an epithet like the n-word, once hurled at African-Americans in this country and banned from polite conversation, now has a broad-based cultural acceptance in our society.
Many African-Americans, and not just the hip-hop generation, say that reclaiming the n-word serves as an act of group agency and as a form of resistance against the dominate culture’s use of it. In other words, only they have a license to use it.
However, the notion that it is acceptable for African-Americans to use the n-word with each other yet it is considered racist for others outside the race to use it unquestionably sets up a double standard. And because language is a public enterprise, the notion that one ethnic group has property rights to the term is an absurdly narrow argument. The fact that African-Americans have appropriated the n-word does not negate our long history of self-hatred.
Unfortunately, controversies seem to erupt regularly into public view. In July 2008, the Rev. Jesse Jackson used the n-word to refer to Obama. Although Jackson and a cadre of African-American leaders conducted a mock funeral in 2007 for the n-word at the NAACP convention in Detroit, the fact that it slipped so approvingly from his mouth illustrates its lingering power.
In January 2011, the kerfuffle concerning the n-word focused on Samuel Langhorne Clemens, known as Mark Twain, in the NewSouth Books edition of his 1885 classic, “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.” In the original edition of the book, the epithet is used 219 times. In a combined effort to rekindle interest in this Twain classic and to tamp down the flame and fury the use of the n-word engenders, Alan Gribben — editor of the NewSouth Edition, and an English professor at Auburn University in Alabama — replaced the n-word with the word “slave.”
In short, the n-word is firmly embedded in the lexicon of racist language used to disparage African-Americans. Our culture’s neorevisionist use of the n-word makes it even harder to purge the sting of the word from the American psyche.
Why?
Because language is a representation of culture. Language reinscribes and perpetuates ideas and assumptions about race, gender, and sexual orientation that we consciously and unconsciously articulate in our everyday conversations about ourselves and the rest of the world, and consequently transmit generationally.
Obama used the n-word appropriately, as an illustration that racism is very much alive. Wilmore used it as a term of endearment to say he can use the word but no white person can. In truth, no one should.
Too many of us keep the n-word alive. It also allows Americans to become numb to the use and abuse of the power this racial epithet still wields, thwarting the daily struggle that many of us undertake to try to ameliorate race relations.
The last thing Obama’s final roasting didn’t need to end on is associating him with the n-word – even as an act of thanks and brotherly love.
READ ON ...
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Liturgy Selection Sacred Living
“Every religion gives its prescription for bringing sacred into daily life. The Native Americans have as one of their most noble ideals that we learn to walk on the Earth in a sacred manner. Yet vast stretches of “civilized” terrain are becoming wasteland. The ancients taught the Earth was alive- a pulsating, evolving Being. To them, nature and the elements were ensouled. All matter and substance were permeated with the mystery of divine immanence. To the ancients, it was obvious that divinity was present in the human soul as well as in the elements of nature. From these certainties streamed the essential sanctity of all life.”[Emory J. Michael, The Alchemy of Sacred Living]
In his closing remarks thanking Obama for his tenure as president and the mark he has made in the world, Wilmore dropped the n-word. And at that moment you heard audible gasps and saw visible grimaces of shock, pain and embarrassment.
“When I was a kid, I lived in a country where people couldn’t accept a black quarterback,” Wilmore said. “Now think about that. A black man was thought by his mere color not good enough to lead a football team — and now, to live in your time, Mr. President, when a black man can lead the entire free world.Words alone do me no justice. So, Mr. President, if i’m going to keep it 100: Yo, Barry, you did it, my n—-. You did it.”
When Wilmore dropped the n-word twitter blew up. And what will probably be debated for a while is whether Wimore went too far. Many of the comments on twitter were asking is the n-word what the American public need to hear associated to Obama’s last months in office, especially given the racial roller coaster the entire country has been on since Obama took office and evident by the treatment of him.
Wilmore won’t be the last African American comedian to use the epithet in public discourse. But how it’s used means everything.
For example, last year when news broke that President Obama used the n-word during the podcast interview “WFT with Marc Maron” about America’s racial history, it caused shock waves. We are shocked because we are all confused as to when — if ever — there is an appropriate context to use the word.
On CNN, legal analyst Sunny Hostin said that Obama’s use of the word was inappropriate because of his office, and given the history of the word itself. New York Times columnist Charles Blow countered Hostin’s assertion, pointing out that Obama used the word correctly: as a teaching moment.
The confusion illustrates what happens when an epithet like the n-word, once hurled at African-Americans in this country and banned from polite conversation, now has a broad-based cultural acceptance in our society.
Many African-Americans, and not just the hip-hop generation, say that reclaiming the n-word serves as an act of group agency and as a form of resistance against the dominate culture’s use of it. In other words, only they have a license to use it.
However, the notion that it is acceptable for African-Americans to use the n-word with each other yet it is considered racist for others outside the race to use it unquestionably sets up a double standard. And because language is a public enterprise, the notion that one ethnic group has property rights to the term is an absurdly narrow argument. The fact that African-Americans have appropriated the n-word does not negate our long history of self-hatred.
Unfortunately, controversies seem to erupt regularly into public view. In July 2008, the Rev. Jesse Jackson used the n-word to refer to Obama. Although Jackson and a cadre of African-American leaders conducted a mock funeral in 2007 for the n-word at the NAACP convention in Detroit, the fact that it slipped so approvingly from his mouth illustrates its lingering power.
In January 2011, the kerfuffle concerning the n-word focused on Samuel Langhorne Clemens, known as Mark Twain, in the NewSouth Books edition of his 1885 classic, “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.” In the original edition of the book, the epithet is used 219 times. In a combined effort to rekindle interest in this Twain classic and to tamp down the flame and fury the use of the n-word engenders, Alan Gribben — editor of the NewSouth Edition, and an English professor at Auburn University in Alabama — replaced the n-word with the word “slave.”
In short, the n-word is firmly embedded in the lexicon of racist language used to disparage African-Americans. Our culture’s neorevisionist use of the n-word makes it even harder to purge the sting of the word from the American psyche.
Why?
Because language is a representation of culture. Language reinscribes and perpetuates ideas and assumptions about race, gender, and sexual orientation that we consciously and unconsciously articulate in our everyday conversations about ourselves and the rest of the world, and consequently transmit generationally.
Obama used the n-word appropriately, as an illustration that racism is very much alive. Wilmore used it as a term of endearment to say he can use the word but no white person can. In truth, no one should.
Too many of us keep the n-word alive. It also allows Americans to become numb to the use and abuse of the power this racial epithet still wields, thwarting the daily struggle that many of us undertake to try to ameliorate race relations.
The last thing Obama’s final roasting didn’t need to end on is associating him with the n-word – even as an act of thanks and brotherly love.
READ ON ...
-------
Liturgy Selection Sacred Living
“Every religion gives its prescription for bringing sacred into daily life. The Native Americans have as one of their most noble ideals that we learn to walk on the Earth in a sacred manner. Yet vast stretches of “civilized” terrain are becoming wasteland. The ancients taught the Earth was alive- a pulsating, evolving Being. To them, nature and the elements were ensouled. All matter and substance were permeated with the mystery of divine immanence. To the ancients, it was obvious that divinity was present in the human soul as well as in the elements of nature. From these certainties streamed the essential sanctity of all life.”[Emory J. Michael, The Alchemy of Sacred Living]
-------
From Children Praying a New Story
A Prayer to do with ChildrenThanks for the Spirit of God in our Lives by Michael Morwood
We give thanks for the Spirit of God
in our world
and in all people.
We give thanks for the people
who show us what the Spirit of God can do
when they allow the Spirit to work in their lives.
We give thanks for their wisdom,
for their care and concern for others,
for their generosity and courage,
and for the many ways they make the world a better place.
We give thanks for the Spirit of God in our lives,
in our own particular gifts and abilities.
May we use our own gifts of the Spirit well
so that God’s Spirit will be seen in all we do and say.
Amen. …read more
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Meditation on CompassionFrom Genuine Happiness, Meditation as the Path to Fulfillment by B. Alan Wallace
Compassion Meditation
Before meditating, bring forth your highest motivation, your most meaningful goals and yearnings. Now settle yours body in a posture of ease, stillness, and vigilance. Remember the sequence. For this session, lasting one ghatika, let your body be still. You’ll be bringing images to mind, like reflections in a pool of water. Reflections are clear only if the water is still. Take three luxurious, deep, full breaths, breathing through your nostrils, breathing down into the abdomen, then expanding the diaphragm and finally breathing up through the chest. Exhale through the nostrils, slowly, deeply and fully, three times.
Now let this mind, which has been driven so hard through the day, come to rest and settle back in to a mode of simple awareness. Feel the tactile sensations throughout your body. If thoughts come, just let them float away without sticking, without your grasping. Release them as if with a sigh of relief, thinking. “I don’t need to catch that particular train.” Be aware of breathing. At the beginning of the next in-breath, mentally and ver briefly count “one.” Then, in a mode of simple awareness, continue to attend to the breathing, counting to twenty-one.
Now let’s again call into play the power of the imagination. Move out of this mode of simple awareness, away from stilling the mind, and bring forth your powers of creative thought. Let’s begin with the body. Affirm to yourself that if you will–as a working hypothesis, if not something you’ve experienced directly–the essential purity of your awareness. This dimension of consciousness is conceptually unstructured, primordially pure, and of the nature of sheer luminosity. And imagine it now, in symbolic form, as an orb of inexhaustible, radiant white light at you heart in the center of your chest. In Indian thought this area–not in the heart organ, but in the center of your chest–is called the heart chakra.
Imagine this light to be one of compassion, of goodness, of joy–utterly and primordially pure. Imagine rays of white light–purifying, soothing, and calming white light–emanating from this orb at your heart and saturating your entire body, right out to the pores of your skin, dispelling all mental and physical afflictions and imbalances.
Now extend the imagination outward and bring to mind, as vividly as you can, another being–this could be one of more persons, or it could be an animal or some other sentient being–someone about whom you care very deeply. Direct your attention to someone who is going through a very difficult time right now. It could be because of physical afflictions or disease, a life situation of conflict, depression, anxiety, or pain. Bring that person to mind.
Now imagine you are this person. Picture yourself undergoing these same problems. Imagine taking on this person’s burden. Now return to yourself and then again attend to this loved one. As the Buddha counseled, attend to this person internally, externally, and both internally and externally. “Then, with a sincere, natural, effortless yearning, bring to mind the wish: May you be free of this suffering and the true sources of this suffering.” Allow compassion to rise from your heart. Then, as you inhale, imaging taking in, in the symbolic form of a dark cloud, the problems, the disease, the mental turmoil, whatever it may be that troubles this person. Imagine this as a dark cloud, and with each inhalation draw in this cloud as if you’re siphoning it off. Draw it in, breath it down to this incandescent orb of light at your heart, and let this darkness be extinguished there, without leaving a trace behind. Imagine this person’s burden, sorrow, illness–whatever it may be–lightening as well. Imagine the person’s relief.
With each in-breath let this yearning arise: “Just as I wish to be free of suffering and the sources of suffering, may you too be free of this pain, free of this distress and its causes.” Imagine the person actually experiencing the transformation, feeling the burden lighten, and breathing more easily. And if there is fear, imagine that fear being calmed.
The imagine the cloud utterly vanishing, the darkness dispelled, not transferred but drawn in and extinguished. Just as when you turn a light on in a dark room, the darkness doesn’t go anywhere; it simply vanishes. Imagine this person free of affliction and experiencing a sense of complete ease and profound relief.
Now expand your awareness without limit to exclude no one, from all sides, from above and below, with each in-breath. Let your yearning arise: “May each individual in the world, like myself, be free of suffering and the sources of suffering.” With each in-breath draw in the misery and distress, the pain and the fear of each sentient being. Draw it into this infinite light, this inexhaustible source of light that can hold the suffering of the world and not be dimmed. Draw it in and extinguish the darkness in the light of your own heart. The nature of compassion is just this: the heartfelt yearning that others might be free of suffering and the sources of their suffering.
Now for a few moments, release your imagination, release your thoughts and aspirations, release all objects of the mind. Rest in the simple nature of your own awareness. Be at ease from your very core. Rest your mind in its own pristine and luminous nature. Simply be aware of being aware.
Pages 124-126
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Excerpts, Activity, Affirmation by Deshna Ubeda
“We begin to live a sacred life when we start to become a source of blessing through our actions. As we apply the dynamic power of the alchemy of the seed, we set in motion the wheels of a better life.”[Emory J. Michael]
read more
From The Alchemy of Sacred Living, Creating a Culture of Light by Emory J. Michael
“Most people are unaware that they are unaware. Awakening itself is a mystery, a miracle of unfolding. Experience gently nudges us toward the threshold of deeper knowing. We cross that threshold as we discover that the world is less outside us than it is within us.”[page 24]
“The path of happiness and sacred living begins with a comprehension of the alchemy of the seed. When we become benefactors–literally, “doers of good,”–our own life will be gradually transformed for the better. Each helpful, generous action–each good thought and sacred feeling–becomes a seed planted in the garden of our personal well-being. In time, we will be astonished and delighted at the harvest of abundance that comes streaming into our personal world.
“In the age to come, to be miserly, greedy or selfish will be seen as a form of illness that blocks the circulatory flow of abundance and blessing. Giving will become a science and an art. In the words of the saintly American spiritual teacher, Hilda Charlton, ‘A life is worthless that does not reach out a helping hand to others.’
“From deep within us comes the impulse to become greater and better. Our deeper self–the spirit-seed in our hearts–prompts us on our journey of transformation. The motivating principle at the heart of the spirit-seed is desire. The essence of this desire is love. As we manifest love through our actions, we come to know that our essential nature, the seed of our spirit, is love itself. By expressing love in our actions and our thoughts, we gradually come to know the truth of our being–that we are love. The greatest gift we can offer is the radiance of heart that springs from our contact with the divine in ourselves and the world. They give the most who radiate the light of understanding in their minds and the warmth of love in their hearts. When our actions are imbued with wisdom and love, we walk in harmony with the sacred laws that govern life. We become emissaries for a new culture of light and beauty on the Earth.
“We begin to live a sacred life when we start to become a source of blessing through our actions. As we apply the dynamic power of the alchemy of the seed, we set in motion the wheels of a better life. A transformation takes place in our inner life of thought and feeling. The wisdom of reciprocity becomes the key to our own soul’s liberation. In time, we will reap the harvest of our sacred seeds and life will crown each of us the master of our personal destiny.”[pages 38-39]
Exercises in Sacred Living: Activating the Alchemy of the Seed
Activity
(Modified) Think of 6 actions that you can perform today that will enhance your own and other people’s lives. These can be any constructive deed: writing a cheerful letter, cleaning out closets and giving charitable donations of clothes you no longer need or use, surprising a friend with a gift, taking someone to lunch, smiling at all the children you see. Write these ideas on a piece of paper. Then today, keep a record of your sowing. Make a note of each “seed.” Consider them as deposits in your heavenly treasury, the balance of which will determine your future circumstances. Get into the habit of releasing constructive currents into the ocean of life. Give those you meet a “flower,” even if it be only in the form of a kind thought. Remember that thoughts, words, and feelings are also seeds. Become a benefactor of those you contact. Begin now to recreate the garden of your life; transform your future by applying the magic of the seed. Continue this practice throughout the week each day.
Affirmations
“Giving opens the way for receiving. I master the law of the seed by giving constructively to all who can benefit by my actions.”
“I transform my life into a beautiful garden by sowing positive seeds each day.”
“The more I give to others of that which is beneficial and helpful, the more I will receive.”[pages 39-40]
Quotes
“As is the gardener, so is the garden.”[Jewish proverb]
“Give and it shall be given unto you”[Jesus]
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READ ON ...
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Click on Amazon Smile and choose ProgressiveChristianity.org as your charity - when you shop Amazon donates .05%.
Events and Updates
2106 Festival of Faiths
May 17 - 21 in Louisville, KY we will explore how different spiritual traditions, teachers and practitioners address violence, heal our wounds and teach active commitment to nurturing peace in ourselves and in the world.
READ ON ...
2106 Festival of Faiths
21st Annual Festival of Faiths: Sacred Wisdom – Pathways to Nonviolence
The 2016 Festival of Faiths will explore how different spiritual traditions, teachers and practitioners address violence, heal our wounds and teach active commitment to nurturing peace in ourselves and in the world.
Charter meetings and gatherings will be scheduled throughout the conference. Visit the Festival of Faiths website for more information for more details, including hotel accommodations.
SPEAKERS INCLUDE:
KAREN ARMSTRONG, PICO IYER, VANDANA SHIVA, JIM WALLIS, INGRID MATTSON, TEDDY ABRAMS, BELL HOOKS, ARUN GANDHI, ALLAN BOESAK, ANAM THUBTEN, ARCHBISHOP JOSEPH E. KURTZ, & MANY MORE! Full Speaker Line Up
Click Here for More Information
Images
From The Alchemy of Sacred Living, Creating a Culture of Light by Emory J. Michael
“Most people are unaware that they are unaware. Awakening itself is a mystery, a miracle of unfolding. Experience gently nudges us toward the threshold of deeper knowing. We cross that threshold as we discover that the world is less outside us than it is within us.”[page 24]
“The path of happiness and sacred living begins with a comprehension of the alchemy of the seed. When we become benefactors–literally, “doers of good,”–our own life will be gradually transformed for the better. Each helpful, generous action–each good thought and sacred feeling–becomes a seed planted in the garden of our personal well-being. In time, we will be astonished and delighted at the harvest of abundance that comes streaming into our personal world.
“In the age to come, to be miserly, greedy or selfish will be seen as a form of illness that blocks the circulatory flow of abundance and blessing. Giving will become a science and an art. In the words of the saintly American spiritual teacher, Hilda Charlton, ‘A life is worthless that does not reach out a helping hand to others.’
“From deep within us comes the impulse to become greater and better. Our deeper self–the spirit-seed in our hearts–prompts us on our journey of transformation. The motivating principle at the heart of the spirit-seed is desire. The essence of this desire is love. As we manifest love through our actions, we come to know that our essential nature, the seed of our spirit, is love itself. By expressing love in our actions and our thoughts, we gradually come to know the truth of our being–that we are love. The greatest gift we can offer is the radiance of heart that springs from our contact with the divine in ourselves and the world. They give the most who radiate the light of understanding in their minds and the warmth of love in their hearts. When our actions are imbued with wisdom and love, we walk in harmony with the sacred laws that govern life. We become emissaries for a new culture of light and beauty on the Earth.
“We begin to live a sacred life when we start to become a source of blessing through our actions. As we apply the dynamic power of the alchemy of the seed, we set in motion the wheels of a better life. A transformation takes place in our inner life of thought and feeling. The wisdom of reciprocity becomes the key to our own soul’s liberation. In time, we will reap the harvest of our sacred seeds and life will crown each of us the master of our personal destiny.”[pages 38-39]
Exercises in Sacred Living: Activating the Alchemy of the Seed
Activity
(Modified) Think of 6 actions that you can perform today that will enhance your own and other people’s lives. These can be any constructive deed: writing a cheerful letter, cleaning out closets and giving charitable donations of clothes you no longer need or use, surprising a friend with a gift, taking someone to lunch, smiling at all the children you see. Write these ideas on a piece of paper. Then today, keep a record of your sowing. Make a note of each “seed.” Consider them as deposits in your heavenly treasury, the balance of which will determine your future circumstances. Get into the habit of releasing constructive currents into the ocean of life. Give those you meet a “flower,” even if it be only in the form of a kind thought. Remember that thoughts, words, and feelings are also seeds. Become a benefactor of those you contact. Begin now to recreate the garden of your life; transform your future by applying the magic of the seed. Continue this practice throughout the week each day.
Affirmations
“Giving opens the way for receiving. I master the law of the seed by giving constructively to all who can benefit by my actions.”
“I transform my life into a beautiful garden by sowing positive seeds each day.”
“The more I give to others of that which is beneficial and helpful, the more I will receive.”[pages 39-40]
Quotes
“As is the gardener, so is the garden.”[Jewish proverb]
“Give and it shall be given unto you”[Jesus]
-------
READ ON ...
-------
Click on Amazon Smile and choose ProgressiveChristianity.org as your charity - when you shop Amazon donates .05%.
Events and Updates
2106 Festival of Faiths
May 17 - 21 in Louisville, KY we will explore how different spiritual traditions, teachers and practitioners address violence, heal our wounds and teach active commitment to nurturing peace in ourselves and in the world.
READ ON ...
2106 Festival of Faiths
21st Annual Festival of Faiths: Sacred Wisdom – Pathways to Nonviolence
The 2016 Festival of Faiths will explore how different spiritual traditions, teachers and practitioners address violence, heal our wounds and teach active commitment to nurturing peace in ourselves and in the world.
Charter meetings and gatherings will be scheduled throughout the conference. Visit the Festival of Faiths website for more information for more details, including hotel accommodations.
SPEAKERS INCLUDE:
KAREN ARMSTRONG, PICO IYER, VANDANA SHIVA, JIM WALLIS, INGRID MATTSON, TEDDY ABRAMS, BELL HOOKS, ARUN GANDHI, ALLAN BOESAK, ANAM THUBTEN, ARCHBISHOP JOSEPH E. KURTZ, & MANY MORE! Full Speaker Line Up
Click Here for More Information
Images
Start:
May 17, 2016
End:
May 21, 2016
Location:
Actors Theatre of Louisville
316 West Main Street
Louisville KY
Organization:
Center for Interfaith Relations
Website:
http://festivaloffaiths.org/
Email:
info@interfaithrelations.org
Telephone:
502.583.3100
View all upcoming events here!
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