Afleveringen
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Christmas may have come and gone almost a week ago, but liturgically at least, we are still in the Christmas Season until Epiphany on January 6th.
As this is being recorded on New Year’s Eve, I thought I’d share a simple meditation of some beautiful Epiphany prayers to closer out our earthly remembrance of the year 2022 and to embark with surer footing on that path to Epiphany this year where we ask to be like the Magi, transformed, enkindled, renewed by God’s manifestation of the Light of the World within and through our own lives.
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For those of you who observe Lent and Easter, I hope that yours was a blessed Lenten season and Easter celebration. I hope that all listeners have had a blessed Winter and the budding leaves and flowers and green of Spring instills hope to the beauty of this year that lies ahead.
During Lent, I came across this quote from David Benner which really spoke to my soul:
“We are created from love, of love, for love. Our existence makes no sense apart from Divine Love.” — David G. Banner
It is so easy in the hustle and bustle of life to forget this. It is so easy in the polarized society we live in to forget that all those we meet are also create from love, of love, for love. The news cycles and the media incite us to boycott, to shame, to call out, to ostracize those we who do not believe as we do. While not enabling and turning a blind eye to those who oppress, to those who discriminate, to those who sew fear, to those who bend the truth, we must all come back to that center of knowing, of living, of reflecting that great truth that all of God’s children are loved by God and you will never look into the eyes of another person whom Divine Love does not love.
So I thought we’d take time to unwind at this moment of time and sit down, relax, take a deep breath. To get comfortable and preferably seated away from our phone, away from a clock. To somehow stop the measure of minutes in our day and minutes we can afford to “make time” to spend in that truth of the Love of Divine Love. To close our eyes, breath in, and just be for a moment with that Love. For it is in moments like these, moments with our loved ones and friends that fond, consoling, comforting memories are made.
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Zijn er afleveringen die ontbreken?
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omorrow is Thanksgiving here in the US. A time when we gather together with family and friends giving thanks for the abundance and opportunity we have in our wonderful democratic republic.
I am looking forward to tomorrow’s Thanksgiving holiday. I hope you are too. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday by far. Has been to some degree since I was a kid.
Over the years, I have gathered and celebrated Thanksgiving in the home I grew up in, the various homes of friends and neighbors, a parish hall of a church, the homes that I have lived in as an adult, the homes of various family members.
I’ve gathered in Tulsa, New Bedford, Tukwila, Boston, Hudson, New Ipswich, Louisa, Virginia Beach, Huntingdon, Floyd and Palymyra with family and friends to celebrate Thanksgiving.
I’ve gathered with beloved family members, beloved friends and acquaintances old and new. I’ve gathered with friends and family of all faiths — Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu and those who don’t subscribe to any one in particular or those who let their subscriptions expire long ago journeying along, hoping to find a renewal of faith, always eager to gather and give thanks and gratitude for the abundance we enjoy in our beloved democratic republic.
I’ve gathered with people on the right, on the left, and those just present with no need to pick a side or color. I’ve gathered with those who support and affirm you, those who like to push your buttons, those who roll their eyes as you are just you, those who love and cherish you being you.
I’ve gathered with many no longer physically present on this earthly journey, with many still present on their earthly journey. I’ve gathered in person. I’ve gathered on the phone — you know those friends and family that Thanksgiving, Christmas and their birthday may be the only times you talk to one another. I’ve gathered on cold Thanksgivings, on mild Thanksgivings where I walked along the beach with only a light sweater on, on rainy dreary Thanksgivings, on sunny bright Thanksgivings.
Each and every Thanksgiving gathering I’ve attended I cherish in my heart. There may have been tension between some of the hosts and hostesses and attendees and friends and family members. There may have been differences of opinion, of faith, of what it was each of us were thankful for.
It’s not the tensions I remember. It’s not the petty things said, thought, expressed that I remember. It’s not the food — no gathering was lacking in that. Nor the drinks or dessert. It’s not the topics discussed I remember. It’s not the opinions or politics of the attendees present at each gathering.
What I remember most about each gathering were the moments where I was able to steal away from my ego and tap into my heart energy, my higher self and realize it was in these gathered moments that memories are made, that love is recorded, that the wonder of having an opportunity be it ever so rare to gather with friends, family, and acquaintances and offer thanksgiving each in our own way transcended time, space, here and now, and all our individual differences. Somehow in that moment, we weren’t just brother, sister, mother, father, niece, nephew, aunt, uncle, grandfather, grandmother, son, daughter, or friend. We were all united by our toddling along, attempting as best we can to express gratitude in this journey and to reflect that great Love from which we all come.
I hope that you have memories of similar gatherings and similar experiences of the eternal power of love in your life as well.
I thought today’s imaginal prayer, would be one of imaginally gathering with our ancestors, our spirit guides, and those we’ve known in this life who have passed over in spirit to help us prepare for the big celebration with family and friends.
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Spei Lumina has been on a hiatus of sorts since April. My apologies for the long delay in publishing a new episode of imaginal prayer during these trying times. If you are like me, the polarity and division that continues within our society and culture between the Left and the Right, Conservatives and Liberals, Maskers and Anti-Maskers, Vaccinated and Unvaccinated in this ongoing post COVID-19 pandemic is truly wearing to your soul. It’s hard to be that reflector of Light, of Hope, of Truth when all around us is division and scorn for the other and those who don’t agree with us.
I’ve been reading some old metaphysical and spiritualist journals and papers from the 1800’s to early 20th century. From 1934 - 1937, Joseph Benner of Akron, OH published a periodical titled The Inner Life - The Herald of the New Age. Benner was the owner of SUN PUBLISHING CO. in Akron, OH. He wrote many books, his most notable was, “The Impersonal Life.” Also known as “The I AM teaching.”
Elvis Presley was known to have been introduced to this book by one of his acquaintances and it was supposedly one of his favorite book that he gave away hundreds of copies of the book during his lifetime.
In the July, 1937 issue of The Inner Life there is an article entitled, “A Challenge to Metaphysicians” wherein the author asks his brothers and sisters in spiritual ministry to consider developing the Christ Consciousness within all by starting their meetings with his proposed invocation and prayers outlined int he article.
What follows is my adaptation of his invocations as an imaginal prayer exercise, helping us to invite that Light of the Christ consciousness within so that we in turn may broadcast that Light, that Love, that truth out to all in these trying times.
I hope you will join me in this imaginal prayer exercise grounding ourselves in the Christ consciousness within each of us and emanating and broadcasting that Light and power and love out to all.
This episode is dedicated to the memory, ministry, and mission of the article’s author who is known simply by the initials H.F.C.
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It seems to me we live in a time where more and more people are being devalued. Where corporate rights appear to be growing at the expense of individual rights. Where, in the age of Artificial Intelligence or AI, many services including customer support and chat support are being replaced by AI bots that supposedly provide the same level of service as their human counterparts once did. The trend seems to be an expanding devaluation of the human person and with this expansion a greater denial of the existence of that which truly provides us value — the soul.
Our value comes from the spark of the divine that innately exists in each and every person. Our value comes in helping nourish that spark within ourselves and shining the light of that spark brightly so as to nourish and heal and restore awareness of that spark within for those individuals directly impacted by this expansion of devaluation of the person.
I recently came across the Gnostic influenced Manichaean writings that really seemed to speak to my soul. Manichaeism would be condemned by the Latin Church as a heresy, the Manichaean writings provide a richness that speaks more true to the human condition as a soul embodied, incarnated in this physical body we live and experience this earthly life than most of the Christian spiritual writings ever shed on the soul. I hope you too find it just as enriching as I did.
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In this age we live in with so much dissension and rhetoric dividing humanity across the globe, I thought it important to remind ourselves of the mandatum Christ left his followers, “To love one another as I have loved you.” The love that Christ was speaking about and instructed and lived out by example is not solely a feeling, or an emotion, rather, it is a dimension with which to live your life. The dimension of love connects you to the divine in a way that no other dimension, no other emotion, no other feeling or thought can.
Please join me.
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A year ago, we closed out 2019 and welcomed 2020 by offering our minds, hearts and wills to allow the Light, Love and Purpose of the Mind of God to enter us through praying the Great Invocation.
What a year it has been.
Who would have imagined that 2020 would bring us the global COVID-19 pandemic and all that resulted from it — the deaths, the infections, the social isolation, the economic impact locally, nationally and globally?
Who would have imagined how contentious the U.S. 2020 Presidential election would be and that we’d have a sitting president long after the electoral college met and voted fail to concede the election to his successor?
Who would have imagined the long overdue cry for racial justice and equality here in the United States rising to a fever pitch and challenging all Americans to acknowledge the Black Lives Matter movement?
Although I haven’t enjoyed all of the social isolation; nor the ugliness and shadow we were all faced to deal with within ourselves and observed in others; nor the economic impact this shutdown and continued responses to curtail the spread of COVID-19 has wreaked upon the livelihoods of friends, family, and neighbors; nor the suffering and struggle those who came down with COVID-19 went through; nor the sadness, grief, and pain those who lost their battle with COVID-19 went through — many isolated and alone without family in the hospital and the grief their loved ones left to mourn them had to go through — many not able to gather together in person with their larger family and clan to celebrate the life of their loved one who died of COVID-19, 2020 will always be a special year for me.
In the last hours of 2020 I have to look back and realize 2020 has not been a total wash out for me. I hope I can keep the awareness and knowledge I’ve gained in 2020 to help shape all the New Years ahead 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024….
May we all take the awareness and growth gained from 2020 and do our part to make all the New Years ahead better and better and better.
As I said last year, I have a strong feeling that 2020 and the decade it will define is going to be a tremendously blessed time for humanity, for light workers, for the cosmos as we all grow in awareness and raise our vibrations to the higher realms.
I can think of no better way to close out 2020 and eagerly anticipate 2021 and the decade that is bursting to unfold within the cosmos than to imaginary pray Alice Bailey’s “The Great Invocation.”
I hope you will be able to participate in this imaginal prayer as 2020 comes to an end and 2021 begins. Regardless of if you are able to do it literally as 2020 ends and 2021 begins are several hours, days, weeks, months later — I know the collective power of all the intentions and imaginings of light within the cosmos will energetically illuminating the hearts, minds and souls of all within the cosmos.
Please join me.
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Welcome to Spei Lumina and day 9 the conclusion of our Novena honoring the Anima Mundi for All Souls day. Today is all souls day — a day set aside by the church to remember all the faithful departed throughout the last year. Year to date, worldwide, 1,206,312 people across the earth have died from COVID-19. In the United States, 235,460 people have died from COVID-19. In Mexico, 91,895 have died from COVID-19. In Canada, 10,179 people have died. Many of our brothers and sisters in North America are grieving the loss of a loved one to this pandemic this All Souls Day. Let us remember the souls of all lost to this pandemic and those left to grieve their loss as we conclude our novena prayer to the Anima Mundi Day Number 9. Our intention today is for Freedom and Liberty.
Novena, 9 days of devotion, 9 days of prayer, 9 ways of showing our dedication to connecting with spirit and interceding. May these 9 days influence a greater connection to Spirit, to the Divine, to the Anima Mundi, the Soul of the World that is just the beginning of a greater relationship that serves to transform the rest of your life and is an ongoing relationship with your soul nourishing and restoring your soul and giving you moment by moment, hour by hour, day by day from now through eternity a greater trust and love of Spirit, the Divine, the Anima Mundi as you have come to know and experience these 9 days.
Please note in the show notes there is a link for the text version of today’s 9th Day Novena prayer on the Angels of the Nativity blog.
The text for today’s novena prayer can be found at: http://angelsofthenativity.org/2020/11/02/anima-mundi-all-souls-day-novena-day-9-for-freedom/
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Welcome to Spei Lumina and day 8 of our Novena honoring the Anima Mundi for All Souls day. This year, All Souls Day occurs on the eve of the US 2020 Presidential Election. This election is positioned to be one of the most important elections in our lifetime. Definitely one of the most important elections in over 50 years, not to mention perhaps the most contentious. America’s democratic republic as we know it and the soul of America as some have coined it is at stake in this election.
Today, Sunday November1st we continue our Novena Prayer to the Anima Mundi Day Number 8. Our intention today is for Integrity.
Also, please note in the show notes there is a link for the text version of today’s 8th Day Novena prayer on the Angels of the Nativity blog.
The text for today’s novena prayer can be found at: http://angelsofthenativity.org/2020/11/01/anima-mundi-all-souls-day-novena-day-8-for-justice/
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Welcome to Spei Lumina and day 7 of our Novena honoring the Anima Mundi for All Souls day. This year, All Souls Day occurs on the eve of the 2020 Presidential Election. This election is positioned to be one of the most important elections in our lifetime. Definitely one of the most important elections in over 50 years, not to mention perhaps the most contentious. America’s democratic republic as we know it and the soul of America as some have coined it is at stake in this election.
Today, Saturday October 31st we continue our Novena Prayer to the Anima Mundi Day Number 7. Our intention today is for Integrity.
Also, please note in the show notes there is a link for the text version of today’s 7th Day Novena prayer on the Angels of the Nativity blog.
The text for today’s novena prayer can be found at: http://angelsofthenativity.org/2020/10/31/anima-mundi-all-souls-day-novena-day-7-for-integrity/
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Welcome to Spei Lumina and day 6 of our Novena honoring the Anima Mundi for All Souls day. This year, All Souls Day occurs on the eve of the 2020 Presidential Election. This election is positioned to be one of the most important elections in our lifetime. Definitely one of the most important elections in over 50 years, not to mention perhaps the most contentious. America’s democratic republic as we know it and the soul of America as some have coined it is at stake in this election.
Today, Friday October 30th we continue our Novena Prayer to the Anima Mundi Day Number 6. Our intention today is for honesty.
Also, please note in the show notes there is a link for the text version of today’s 6th Day Novena prayer on the Angels of the Nativity blog at: http://angelsofthenativity.org/2020/10/30/anima-mundi-all-souls-day-novena-day-6-for-honesty/
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Welcome to Spei Lumina and day 5 of our Novena honoring the Anima Mundi for All Souls day. This year, All Souls Day occurs on the eve of the 2020 Presidential Election. This election is positioned to be one of the most important elections in our lifetime. Definitely one of the most important elections in over 50 years, not to mention perhaps the most contentious. America’s democratic republic as we know it and the soul of America as some have coined it is at stake in this election.
Today, Thursday October 29th we continue our Novena Prayer to the Anima Mundi Day Number 5. Our intention today is for dignity.
Also, please note in the show notes there is a link for the text version of today’s 5th Day Novena prayer on the Angels of the Nativity blog.
http://angelsofthenativity.org/2020/10/29/anima-mundi-all-souls-day-novena-day-5-for-dignity/
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Welcome to Spei Lumina and day 4 of our Novena honoring the Anima Mundi for All Souls day. This year, All Souls Day occurs on the eve of the 2020 Presidential Election. This election is positioned to be one of the most important elections in our lifetime. Definitely one of the most important elections in over 50 years, not to mention perhaps the most contentious. America’s democratic republic as we know it and the soul of America as some have coined it is at stake in this election.
Today, Wednesday October 28th we continue our Novena Prayer to the Anima Mundi Day Number 4. Our intention today is for honor.
Also, please note in the show notes there is a link for the text version of today’s 4th Day Novena prayer on the Angels of the Nativity blog.
The text for today’s novena prayer can be found at: http://angelsofthenativity.org/2020/10/28/anima-mundi-all-souls-day-novena-day-4-for-honor/
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Welcome to Spei Lumina and day 3 of our Novena honoring the Anima Mundi for All Souls day. This year, All Souls Day occurs on the eve of the 2020 Presidential Election. This election is positioned to be one of the most important elections in our lifetime. Definitely one of the most important elections in over 50 years, not to mention perhaps the most contentious. America’s democratic republic as we know it and the soul of America as some have coined it is at stake in this election.
Today, Tuesday October 27th we continue the third day of our Novena Prayer to the Anima Mundi. Our intention today is for kindness.
Also, please note in the show notes there is a link for the text version of today’s 3rd Day Novena prayer on the Angels of the Nativity blog.
The text for today’s novena prayer can be found at: http://angelsofthenativity.org/2020/10/27/anima-mundi-all-souls-day-novena-day-3-for-kindness/
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Welcome to Spei Lumina and day 2 of our Novena honoring the Anima Mundi for All Souls day. This year, All Souls Day occurs on the eve of the 2020 Presidential Election. This election is positioned to be one of the most important elections in our lifetime. Definitely one of the most important elections in over 50 years, not to mention perhaps the most contentious. America’s democratic republic as we know it and the soul of America as some have coined it is at stake in this election.
Today, Monday October 26th we continue the second day of our Novena Prayer to the Anima Mundi. Our intention today is for compassion.
Also, please note in the show notes there is a link for the text version of today’s 2nd Day Novena prayer on the Angels of the Nativity blog.
The text for today’s novena prayer can be found at: http://angelsofthenativity.org/2020/10/26/anima-mundi-all-souls-day-novena-day-2-for-compassion/
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Welcome to Spei Lumina as we kick off Season 3. This year, All Souls Day occurs on the eve of the 2020 Presidential Election. This election is positioned to be one of the most important elections in our lifetime. Definitely one of the most important elections in over 50 years, not to mention perhaps the most contentious. America’s democratic republic as we know it and the soul of America as some have coined it is at stake in this election.
Perhaps, it is no coincidence that this presidential election occurs the day after All Souls Day, the day in the church’s calendar when we recall those who have recently passed and honor their lives.
Today, Sunday October 25th we begin praying a novena to the World Soul — the Anima Mundi. Praying for her protection, restoration, and guidance as America goes to the polls and votes for the next president. I hope you will join us in praying this novena — nine days of a devotional prayer to the Anima Munda for the healing of America and the recovery of America from those who would seek to see our democracy and brotherhood amongst all our citizens destroyed and for the transformation of America and the world to a more heart centric consciousness where charity, compassion, kindness, honor, respect, dignity, honesty, integrity and celebration are lifted up as the ideals to model in this earthly journey.
If you catch this episode after October 25th, no worries, if you feel drawn to pray the novena with us, begin day 1 whenever you may catch it and continue for 9 days.
Also, please note in the show notes there is a link to a pdf file for all text version of all nine days of our novena.
The text for today’s novena prayer can be found at: http://angelsofthenativity.org/2020/10/25/anima-mundi-all-souls-day-novena-day-1-for-charity/
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The holidays are fast approaching, as is the 2020 US Presidential election. The rhetoric and polarity on both sides is ratcheting up in the final march to the election. We are bombarded with so much mixed messages, false truths, half truths, fake truths and outright lies. All in an effort to push our buttons to live out of fear and reaction. To live from a place of bigotry and hate. To live from a place of defensiveness.
It’s enough sometimes to wonder what exactly is the truth and where can the Divine be in all this chaos.
So much of our life is built around simply hearing the information media broadcasts to us only to react to it.
To refresh my soul, I don’t seek to hear so much as to listen to that still quiet whisper of the divine calling to me and respond and follow in helping to reflect more of the healing, loving, and rejuvenating energy of the divine, of Source in my life through my words and actions and in so doing, reflect that energy of the Divine within the cosmos.
I started this podcast over 2 years ago with mission in mind. I hope that you have found this podcast beneficial in helping you quiet down, pause, and open your imagination to the imaginal realm, the Divine realm, and be illuminated by Source to responding by following that illumination and adapting it in your lives through your thoughts, words and actions and likewise helping to reflect that Divine energy within and through the cosmos.
Tonight’s podcast episode is the 20th episode of Season 2 and our final episode for Season 2. I thought that as we seek to be instruments reflecting the Divine, reflecting Source in the cosmos during these tumultuous times that imaginally praying the peace prayer of St. Francis would be a great imaginal prayer to wind down October with as we anticipate the outcome of the presidential election here in the United States.
Also stay tuned for the announcement of the special way we will be opening up Season 3 beginning with our first episode of Season 3 being published this Sunday October 25th, 2020
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As this episode is being recorded, the death toll to the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States has exceeded 200,000. I continue to find myself occasionally overwhelmed by the enormity of the impact this pandemic is having at the global, national, and local levels. Pondering the economic impact even at the local level is overwhelming with concern as I see and hear about local business shutdown or furloughing. Pondering the human impact as I learn of friends and acquaintances who have lost loved ones to COVID-19 and who themselves have contracted the virus and recovered from it adjusting to a new normal until they are back on their feet is overwhelming.
I thought the imaginal prayer we’d walk through today is the Sanctuary of the World Soul meditation reflecting on the 1st Creation story in Genesis allowing it to help us tune into the world soul. There seems to be so much void and chaos in the world wanting to negate the good that is in the world, that exists within everyone. May we proclaim “let there be light” in all the areas of the world today so being ravaged by the negation of the void.
I hope you will join me, soul to soul, in creating sanctuary for your soul, sanctuary for the world soul, to find rest, to rest in that Love, rest in that Light, radiate that Light and radiate that Love from your soul to where it is needed the most. Helping nurture hope, healing and consolation in the cosmos during this COVID-19 pandemic shutdown. Helping shine that light of Hope, of Love, of transformation upon and within ourselves and throughout the cosmos.
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I don’t know about you, but I hurt. I hurt seeing an America so divided. I hurt seeing an America stirred to react out of fear. So stirred to react in bigoted ways. So stirred to react in unloving ways, to act out of hate and spite. I hurt seeing Americans throw their support behind a leader who shows no remorse for the ways his words and actions divide, kill, and harm Americans and America. As the rhetoric, fear mongering, and polarity heats up seeking to sew only dissension and division during this election cycle, may we remember we are not called to live in fear, nor anger, nor to be divided from our neighbor and our brother and sisters. We are called to walk in love.
In his book, The Four Loves, C.S. Lewis describes the four loves found in scripture. — storge, philia, eros, and agape.
First, there’s storge — the affectionate bond that grows between parents and children, brothers and sisters, and family members.
Second, philia the powerful emotional bond experienced between close friends; the most general love found in Scriptures that includes the love for fellow humans, care, respect, and compassion for those in need.
Thirdly, there’s eros the sensual romantic love between two people celebrated and enjoyed as a blessing from God.
All three of these loves carry a spark of the Divine, of Source and when freely shared and experienced between and among all of God’s children, each and every one of us these loves reflect and shine a glimpse of the Divine Light, of Source upon the cosmos. That healing love reflected on the cosmos unites, heals, and restores our souls but no love does all of this greater than the last and greatest of these loves — agape.
Agape is the immeasurable, incomparable love for all of creation. It the perfect love, unconditional love, sacrificial love, and pure love from Source.
Love is the most powerful, transformative, upbuilding, healing emotion that humanity can experience, express, and share with others. Love is the closest emotion, force, action, behavior, influence that animates us which makes us as close to God as possible. Love is the most unifying force that brings us in unity with Source, with God, with our creator.
I thought imaginally praying with the four loves of scripture and basing our meditation on the universal power of LOVE, we can heal our souls and the souls of our brothers and sisters during this peri-coved 19 highly polarized 2020 Presidential election cycle we are about to wrap up in the next few months. I hope you will join me.
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In this peri-Covid-19 world we are experiencing right now, it seems like the world is full of provocateurs provoking the fears, the prejudices, the insecurities and pet peeves of everyone. It is so easy to fall into the trap of reacting to the machinations of the provocateurs and doing exactly what they want you to do — to react with anger, to react with spite, to react with frustration, to react with meanness, to react with blaming and similar snide attitudes to those we don’t agree with. Provocateurs know that stirring up trouble is easy and it’s easier if you can tap into the emotional reactionary sides of people based on fear, hate, or prejudice.
This is a time, like no other, when we must shut out the noise of the provocateurs and listen to that small voice of God, the Divine, of Source calling within us and step into fully and joyfully being a vocateur — someone completely living out their vocation and allowing their spark of the Divine to brightly shine as they do so. Each and everyone of us has a vocation, a calling from God, from source which is our soul's purpose in life.
The provocateurs of this age want to dupe us into thinking whatever we do will never make a difference, that we don’t have a purpose. We know, as light workers and those committed to shining the light of hope, the light of truth, the light of love in the cosmos that fulling living out our vocation is the way our unique spark of the Divine shines from and through us in the world lighting hope, truth, and love in the cosmos.
I thought tonight we would imaginally pray with a few verses from the Nag Hammadi text Trimorphic Protennioia or Three Forms of First Thought to help us raise our frequencies to listening to that call from source and shutting out the racket of the provocateurs all around us.
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