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Personal Spirituality 2005 June-July Flipbook PDF
Henry Reed, Destiny of the Body, Affirmation, Destiny of the Soul, Feminine Spirituality of Patience, Is Creating Our Ow
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Association for Research and Enlightenment 215 67th Street Virginia Beach, VA 23451-2061 USA
Association for Research and Enlightenment, Inc.
Henry Reed, Editor
June-July 2005
Destiny of the Body
Destiny of the Soul
Our Affirmation for June
Our Affirmation for July
ave you planned what your body will look like in your next life? It’s easy to think we can reclaim our spot in heaven by being mentally and spiritually good, but what about our physicality? If we think we do not need a body in heaven, the tendency is to overlook its value, to think of it as just a tool to use until it can be discarded. Not so! The mind of the Great Builder created perfect holographic souls of the Creative Force, in its own image, complete with free wills. Our physical body is a reflection of the accumulated understandings of our soul. It is with free will that we shape and understand our experiences. We will fit into that spot we are aiming to reclaim only when we understand perfectly the truth of our oneness with God. Our physical body reflects our soul’s choices. As we learn how to let go of imperfections by recognizing the value of all our experiences– happy and sad, our body changes. God doesn’t make mistakes. This refashioning of the body occurs over lifetimes. It’s not too late to begin body sculpting now for your future lives.
he destiny of the soul mirrors its origin in God. It is through experience, both in the earth plane and in spiritual planes, that the soul makes this journey. Nothing is a waste of time. Nothing done badly is permanent, and no matter how embarrassing, hurtful, or egotistical, nothing can put us off our path back to Great Mystery, unless we choose such a fate ourselves. The soul learns from its experiences, and these lessons create the history of the soul. Knowledge is good. Understanding is better. But application is the best. It is what the soul applies in its experiences that makes for progress. Knowing that we are souls is good, understanding our oneness with God is better, but treating the people we meet as God is even better. Learn from the story of a young and passionate Jesus, who threw rocks in a Temple and embarrassed his elders in public. Yet he carried the Christ consciousness at all times. By the example of His life, we can carry that same consciousness with us as we go about our daily business on this planet.
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The “Destiny of the Body” Affirmation: Lord, use me in whatever way or manner that my body may be as a living example of Thy love to the brethren of our Lord.
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The “Destiny of the Soul” Affirmation: Lord, let me–my mind, my body, my soul–be atone with Thee: that I–through Thy promises in Him, Thy son–may know Thee more and more.
A Feminine Spirituality of Patience
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he feminine dimension of our nature is vitally important to developing God consciousness. Among the qualities Cayce often mentions, I’d like to explore patience as a case study in feminine spirituality. We know that patience is important. We often have trouble with it. Yet Edgar Cayce claims that patience is a spiritual gift. Can we learn anything useful about patience by examining it as a feminine quality? To do so requires shifting our understanding of the feminine to a universal language that goes beyond gender identities, so that both men and women can develop these qualities without regard to cultural stereotypes of the two sexes. The novel The DaVinci Code heightened the public debate about the role of women in religion. A recent issue of Time magazine had a cover story about the growing acceptance among Protestants of the spiritual importance of Mary, mother of Jesus. Awaiting the announcement of the new Pope, there was discussion of the importance of allowing women to become priests. In the public consciousness, there is a great deal of support for acknowledging the importance of women in our spiritual life. In the Edgar Cayce readings, there are many stories of women whose consciousness and activities were of great spiritual importance. Cayce also reveals that as souls we are of neither sex, but contain both masculine and feminine attributes and have had incarnations both as men and as women. God has both masculine and feminine qualities and these qualities manifest, not just in men and women, but in all aspects of creation. How are we to address these Page 2
masculine and feminine aspects of creation in a way that transcends gender identity, that is, that makes it equally possible for both men and women to relate to these qualities? We can use abstract terms such as the “archetypal feminine,” or the “transpersonal feminine.” Alternatively, we can use the terms from the East, Yin and Yang. We can see qualities in nature which in themselves are neither male nor female, such as the penetrating power of lightning versus the yielding quality of water, or sunlight versus reflected moonlight. Sometimes, however, such terms might imply to some that one attribute is implicitly valued over another. For example, if we equate masculine with the active principle and feminine with the receptive, the risk is that women, naturally identifying with the feminine principle, might feel that their active side is not recognized. “Biology is not destiny!” the politically-minded feminist philosopher reminds us. Modern research, however, on the brain and neurochemistry (hormones) has demonstrated that men and women have functionally different brains. When listening, women show brain activity on both sides of the brain, while men show it only on one side. The patterning of neurochemistry is different for men and women, creating different behavioral patterns. Someone could assert that it is easier for women to learn patience because of these differences. On the internet, if you “Google” the phrase “women listen better than men,” you’ll find this scientific research, and more. Some religious groups build upon descriptions of the female brain to support Biblical prescriptions for appropriate feminine behavior.
Conversely, the F.B.I. website calls for more female agents because they believe that women are better interrogators of suspects. The reasoning is that a woman’s brain specializes in diffuse, rather than focused, awareness, and is better able to detect subliminal clues of deception expressed in facial micro-movements. While women may feel that some of the religious interpretations of the brain research is limiting, they might find the F.B.I.’s spin supportive of women’s special skills. Nevertheless, the discussion remains constricted within the concept of gender roles rather than dimensions of human consciousness. How can we discuss the feminine side of spirituality without making reference, either directly or by analogy, with women, implying perhaps that women are more spiritual, or that they are more patient than men, who have to play catch-up, or that women “should” be patient, whereas men can be allowed free rein? As I contemplated this question, I tentatively concluded that it was not possible. The best I could do was to think of the symbols of the chalice and the blade, as each seem to be in equal esteem. I settled on a concept of the abstract feminine as the capacity to receive and contain. The embodiment of the feminine is the womb, or capacity to become pregnant. The feminine potential of pregnancy knows how to “create space” in which something can happen, a chalice to hold new life. When I think of patience as the consciousness of pregnancy, then things fall into place for me. In this way, patience can be seen as a positive attribute, creative, active, and yet very feminine. The consciousness of pregnancy means an awareness that something “other” has interacted with something within to create something new, something that is not yet manifest in the world, but which will be manifest at some time in the future. We might be excited about the pregnancy, naturally looking forward to the arrival of the child. Yet we realize June-July 2005
that certain events must take place in order for the child to be viable for birth, to be able to live in this world. When asked for a symbol for patience, Edgar Cayce gave the symbol of the plant. You can nurture a plant, but it has its own timetable, its own developmental needs. You don’t hurry a plant’s growth by pulling on its leaves. One has to wait, but not a passive waiting, but one must step aside and allow the laws of pregnancy to rule, rather than the laws of our own hopes and wishes. Understood as pregnancy, patience is not simply a passive waiting, but rather an attentive posture, stimulating intuition of inner developments and insights on how to nurture this growth. When asked how Jesus would define patience, Cayce responded, “Know ye that, in patience possess ye your souls! In interpreting, then, how one possesses their souls, that in the LOSS of patience there is the entering—as He gave—of those influences that would separate the real self, the soul, from the Maker. Hence in patience POSSESS ye your souls” (26224). In another reading, Cayce suggests that one of the problems with understanding patience is the connotation that it costs you–is a hindrance, rather than a blessing or gift. Yet Cayce describes patience as a gift, an actual path of understanding for our three-dimensional consciousness to become aware of the infinite, of our oneness with God. When we “lose patience,” we entertain actions that interfere with the natural growth process our spiritual nature requires. We separate ourselves from God’s plan by pushing our own agendas. Mary, mother of Jesus, demonstrated patience in her willingness to offer herself to the needs of the divine child conceived within her. We can see Mary’s response as emblematic of our James Redfield, author of The Celestine Prophecy will be at A.R.E. August 26 @7:30 p.m. He will talk about the filming of the book which is just wrapping up. For info and to sign up, call 1.888.273.0020.
June-July 2005
potential acceptance of God’s seed within us, and our cooperating with spiritual nature as this seed, the Christ Consciousness lying dormant within us, comes to term and is born in flesh, in the life we lead on earth. On the other hand, in our contemporary society, the frequency of Cesarean births is on the rise. This procedure reflects a masculine sense of values, having control over the timing of the birth and its process, and assuming responsibility by directing the process rather than by nurturing it. As I meditated on the idea of patience as the consciousness of pregnancy, I realized a deeper connection. The I Ching gave me my first clue. It labels the masculine as “the creative” and the feminine as “the receptive.” It explains that underlying the creative is the more essential core notion of “movement,” or “first cause.” In some religions, God is conceived as movement, awakening, light. In the Aztec iconography, for example, an ideogram for God, “Ollin,” translates as movement. Movement requires, however, that it relate to a context, an environment. Movement can exist only in relation to something else that doesn’t move. In our three dimensional world, movement is defined, in fact, relative to the context of time and space (as in so many miles an hour). Thus the environment of time and space provides the womb, the stage, the possibility for movement. In order to move, to create, to begin, God had to express Itself in both the masculine and feminine manner: movement contained in time and space. Such a vision gives the feminine side of God a role equal to the masculine side. The one makes the other possible.
In his story of creation, Cayce described how God expressed Itself as souls, each a divine light vibration from the creator. It was God’s intention that the creative motion of expressing souls would be reflected in the companionship that the souls provided the creator. The feminine aspect of soul provides companionship. Perhaps it was the masculine aspect that initiated the separation, for the masculine, often called the Logos, is the sword that defines an idea by separating it from its context. To provide for a path of reunion, God created the skein of time and space. This environment allows us the stage upon which we grow through our experiences. Modern physics has shown that time and space are not absolute concepts and are tied in with consciousness itself. Within conscious experience, time and space are interdependent, requiring that, in our experience, we observe motion within the context of time and space. What does this say for patience? In the same manner as meditation is being receptive and listening to God, so is patience an empathic understanding, a force for companionship with the creator as the God seed develops within us. Like the audience for a show, patience is the receptivity that provides the awareness of God consciousness growing within us. When we are confronted with a situation that is not going according to plan, we need not fret and begrudgingly wait in “patience.” Instead, we can be willing to be “pregnant with understanding,” realizing that a new opportunity has arisen to intuit God’s plan for that situation and our own role as companion in that growth, step by step as we consistently, and patiently, apply what we know. Page 3
Is Creating Our Own Reality a Burden?
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oes it seem that teenagers resist the idea of “taking responsibility” for their lives? You’d think they’d love to be in the driver’s seat to create their future, that they’d appreciate the freedom and adventure the idea might suggest. Nevertheless, there’s often resistance. Perhaps because of their age, they may lack the confidence that they could successfully manage that responsibility. Maybe it’s easier to look outside themselves for reasons why they might have difficulty living the good life, for inwardly they believe that they may not have “the right stuff.” Today, those of our generation with a spiritual mindset affirm the slogan, “you create your own reality.” It’s clearly a statement of personal responsibility. Yet I have often found that this belief leads to guilt feelings and other dead ends rather than to the inspiration to re-purpose one’s life when confronting obstacles and challenges. I don’t think that needs to be the case. In one Edgar Cayce reading (3395-2) the person asks, “Is the ill health which I have been experiencing the past years the result of mistakes of a past life or is it due to something amiss in this present life?” Cayce answers, “Both.... That brought into materiality is first conceived in spirit. Hence as we have indicated, all illness is sin; not necessarily of the moment, as man counts time, but as a part of the whole experience. For God has not purposed or willed that any soul should perish, but purgeth everyone by illness, by prosperity, by hardships, by those things needed, in order to meet self— but in Him, by faith and works, are ye made every whit whole.” Association for Research & Enlightenment (A.R.E.) 215 67th Street, Virginia Beach, VA 23451
www.edgarcayce.org 1-800-333-4499 Copyright © 2005 by the A.R.E., Inc. This newsletter is one of the monthly benefits to A.R.E. members. Membership is $48 per year. To join, see the contact information above; to send a letter to the editor, write c/o Editor, P.S., to address above, or email:
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On the other hand, in one Biblical story (John 9), Jesus and his disciples meet a man congenitally blind. The disciples ask, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be made manifest in him.” Jesus then proceeds to heal the man of his blindness. Here are two different encounters asking the same question. In the first case, Cayce seems to agree that the person brought on her own illnesses by past sins, and yet suggests that these problems are part of God’s plan. In the second case, Jesus seems to indicate that the past is not relevant. He neither confirms, or denies the sins of the past, but rather notes that there is a purpose in the blindness, a purpose that Jesus serves by showing that God can heal anything. Too often, when we are in the midst of a situation, and we mutter Cayce’s axiom that “all we meet is self,” the tone of our voice conveys the feeling that our predicament, whatever it might be, is like an unsavory mug shot, showing for all the world our imperfections and failures. To assume 7KLV1HZVOHWWHULVRQHRI\RXU $5(PHPEHUVKLSEHQHÀWV $VDPHPEHU\RXPD\VHOHFWDQ\RQHRI WKHIROORZLQJQHZVOHWWHUVIUHH 3HUVRQDO6SLULWXDOLW\ 7UXH+HDOWK $QFLHQW0\VWHULHV