Archive for the ‘Religion’ Category

I think it’s important to disclose a vested interest up front. I am an American Jew, so the fate of U.S.-Israeli relations matters to me for three reasons. As an American, I want to keep close those nations that are democratic in nature and founded upon principles and values similar to those of my country.  As a Jew, I am emotionally and historically tied to the land of Israel and, particularly, its reestablishment as the Jewish homeland in 1948. As an inhabitant of planet Earth, I want the highest good for all concerned.  Having now indicated that I have a “dog in this hunt” (actually, three dogs), I now approach the topic of a recent U.S. State Department action.

Yesterday, our State Department issued an official communication regarding travel by one of its representatives. A screen shot of the original release looked like this:

The problem with the release is that it distinguished Jerusalem, the capital of Israel, from Israel itself. The other names in the title of the release are countries, as is Israel. So, the implication is that in some way Jerusalem is independent of Israel. This is a fiction but one which I believe the Obama Administration would like to foster as it has previously. This is not the first time Jerusalem has been singled out by this Administration and referenced as being separate from Israel. And as happened on prior occasions, when called on it, the Administration made a “correction.” Now, the corrected version reads “Acting Under Secretary Kathleen Stephens Travels to Algiers, Doha, Amman, Jerusalem, and Tel Aviv. (italics added).

So, where’s the harm? Well, none… if it were a one time, isolated “mistake.” But it is instead a pattern of words and actions by Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, this State Department and this White House that have been hostile to a longtime friend and ally.

In so many ways we are living through an extraordinary time of change. What accompanies change is chaos. In times of chaos it is best to know what is at your core and be able to access it should you need to stabilize and even, perhaps, defend what you believe in and value. The same is true for nations.

In a technological world experiencing rapid, global, political upheaval we are both connected and reliant upon one another to a greater degree than has ever historically been the case. For any nation, ours included, seeking to self-organize within the larger self-organization taking place globally, we would be wise to know who our friends are and treat them as such.

For our government to willfully, blatantly and repeatedly disregard both U.S. law, which recognizes Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, as well as Israel’s decision as where it chooses to place its capital within its own borders, is not only a violation of the Jerusalem Embassy Act passed by the U.S. Congressional in 1995 but also an insult to Israel. Worth noting is that only when Israel has been in political, military and geographic control of Jerusalem have all three major world religions had the right and the access to worship.

In case you haven’t had the experience, friendships don’t survive repeated insults. It makes one wonder if that’s the real purpose after all.

So I’m wondering out loud because if I’ve learned one thing from history its to not be quiet and to not sit down.

 

 

What if water is the Earth’s cerebral-spinal fluid and oil is her blood?

What if the starving child in Africa or Tennessee is your belly aching?

What if breath is a gift given anew every second and you haven’t said “thank you” lately or ever.

What if thinking is not the same as being Conscious?

What if forgiving yourself and others neutralizes every bad choice ever made and you get to choose again?

What if living on the edge is a good thing if the edge is where Spirit and matter intersect?

What if miracles only happen to people who believe they exist?

What if laughter heals and you’ve lost your joy for life?

What if God is a verb and Its you in action?

What if messianic isn’t an adjective but an awareness?

What if every one of these is true?

What if there is only One of Us?

Then Who wrote this and Who’s reading it?

Many think Whitney Houston died too young but I think she died right on schedule. I am not intending to be callous or glib when I say that.  Decades ago I wrote that “when someone loves you it’s possible that the time comes when the only thing they have left to give you is their absence.” I think Whitney Houston has left us with a timely and priceless gift. I only hope we are enlightened enough to know how to use it.

Her blessings were many…her beauty, her voice, her faith.  She lived a life rich in the fullness of them all.  She also struggled with the disease of the 21^st century: addiction.  In her case, it was to drugs and alcohol. But addiction comes in as many forms as there are desires and presently, those of us living in this Nation of abundance are addicted to many. Whether its cocaine, sex, alcohol, wealth, chocolate, government welfare or youth…whatever…we are a Nation enslaved to our wants and desires. Our affluence allows us to indulge them all. Even welfare, one might argue, is the result of affluence. How many people of the world suffer hunger, die daily from hunger, because they live in countries too poor to provide government welfare. Even the poorest of us in this great Nation are not above losing sight of perspective and gratitude.

So why tie all of this to Whitney Houston’s death? In watching her funeral on Saturday, I noted that with a worldwide viewership, she managed to bring God center stage for a variety of religions and peoples across the globe.  Her legacy isn’t song or fashion. It’s the power of faith and the Light that shines from one who has it. It was her faith that was supporting her on the way back from addiction.

By example of the lives she touched, and the sheer power of her faith, she has bequeathed us a goldmine in tough economic times. She has pointed the way toward true wealth that enriches the Soul.  The wealth that flows from Love and Faith.

I only hope we are awake enough to not squander our windfall.

 

Glenn Beck was responding to a caller on his morning radio show who asked Mr. Beck’s take on Ron Paul’s superior ability over Rick Santorum to handle the fiscal crisis.  Mr. Beck responded with an analogy to Thomas Paine and George Washington. He elaborated that while Paine was vital to the success of the American Revolution vis-a-vis his courageous and inspired writing, the colonists’ efforts could not have ended in liberty without the faith, integrity and ethical certainty that Washington exemplified.

The exchange got me to thinking. Washington had Martha, who was known to support her husband even so far as to come to the battlefield to be with him and tend to the troops. Who did Paine have?

It turns out that Paine was married twice. His first wife died in childbirth a year into the marriage. He then married a second time several years later only to become legally separated shortly thereafter due to a disappointing and disharmonious relationship.

While it is not necessarily true that “behind ever great man there is a great woman,” I would argue that the vital role women have played throughout human history has been all but ignored. The Divine Feminine is within us all as is the Divine Masculine. We are created in the image of God…male and female alike. To revere one while dismissing or denigrating the contributions of the other is to not only deny one half of who we are but also to deny us full access to the total energies and potential for co-creation that is our birthright.

Each aspect of Divinity has its own unique power. Those powers are meant to co-exist in co-creation for the purpose of the highest good for all concerned. Together they are able to accomplish what neither could accomplish on its own.

So, if I could have joined in the conversation Mr. Beck had with his caller, I would have added that while the Nation needed Washington as it needs the integrity, faith and certainty of Rick Santorum… George needed Martha as Rick needs Karen.

As for the larger picture, each of us needs to resurrect the Divine Feminine within ourselves and balance it with the Divine Masculine. Once that is done, we can attract others who are equally balanced and, together, co-create the world of peace we so desperately seek.

When was the last time you calculated percentage ratios in your head?  Try this math problem:

Question: If there are 1426 people named in the Bible, and 111 of them are women, what percentage of those named are women?* (Answer below)

Okay, so it isn’t about them math. But I got your attention… so bear with me a little longer.

Who among us doesn’t know we are in a global mess that is on the brink of some rather potentially disastrous outcomes? Why do you think that is? Generally speaking, it’s a balance issue. When things are out of balance, whether its Nature or humanity, bad things happen. So how is humanity out of balance?

Let’s return to the math problem.

For thousands of years, as many as 5000 years, we have been writing and repeating history that alternatively excludes or marginalizes the Divine Feminine. Now if you hear the word feminine and your brain says feminist you’re way off track. This isn’t about force. It’s about power. True power.

The same book that disproportionately excludes the contribution by women begins with the statement that we were created “male and female alike.” It’s difficult, if not impossible, for any thinking person to reconcile much of what is alleged to have occurred from that point forward vis-à-vis the sexes. For having created us alike, we are told to believe that from that point forward we were to be treated and judged differently. It begs the question,

Why? Because woman (Eve) and the snake entered into an unholy alliance? I think not.

It’s much more likely, not to mention plausible, that the symbol of woman’s (Sophia’s) wisdom, which was represented symbolically by the snake long before monotheism and the rise of patriarchy, was deliberately targeted as the enemy and root of evil by a male dominated society and male recorders of history.

So, from that we have evolved, or devolved, to where we presently find ourselves…out of balance and sorely lacking in the necessary contributions that draw their origin from the Divine Feminine. The one half of Creator energy that is vital to the balanced and harmonious functioning of the whole.

What to do?

Each of us, male and female alike, must awaken to the Divine Feminine within us. We must awaken to the creative, compassionate, non-combative and allowing energies that rightfully flow from the Divine Feminine aspect of Creator.

Only when we bring ourselves into balance can we hope to create a world in balance. I hope we figure this one out very soon.

Have you checked the scale lately? It’s about to tip over.

 

*Answer: 7.7%

In a recent conversation with a friend, she told me that the reason she has never been interested in politics is because it’s all a lie.  However, recently she delved in for a brief visit and came away with her beliefs reinforced.  After watching the Republican Presidential debates, she called me and said “Obama has lied to us for three years. I watched those Republican contenders and it’s so obvious they will say anything to get the nomination. They are all alike. Politics is professional lying.”

I didn’t have much in my bag of responses to dissuade my friend, mostly because my heart wouldn’t have been in refuting her conclusion. The lying and pandering has definitely played itself out.

So, just maybe it’s not a political leader we should be seeking as much as a spiritual one. By spiritual, I don’t mean religious. The bureaucracies, corruption and politics inherent within organized religion are as much the cause of our current state of things as is secular politics.

By spiritual, I mean the likes of Moses, Buddha, Jesus and Gandhi.  These were not people marketing religion. They were people who each had a deeply personal and profound spiritual experience and then lived the truth of that experience.

Perhaps Gandhi, a former lawyer, is the best example for our current needs. Mainly because by his applying his spiritual awakening to his beliefs about national autonomy and individual dignity, he achieved politically what all the politicians and militarists were unable to do. One man, certain of his faith, his ethics, and his path changed the destiny of two nations and perhaps more.

So, as a former lawyer myself, I am rightfully an advocate of exercising our Constitutional right to vote. As such, I encourage all to stay alert and involved in the 2012 election process and make your voice heard. However, your greatest impact will be in emulating Gandhi and following his advice to “be the change you want to see in the world.”

You never know.

You could be the spiritual leader that turns it all around.

To be right up front, I didn’t know who Adam Carolla was until this morning. I do now. His interview rant against the Occupy Wall Street crowd has gone viral. Having listened to it I can understand why. It’s a no-holds-barred-expletive-riddled diatribe on where we’ve gone wrong as a society. But for me, it’s the last line Carolla utters that’s worth a follow-up.

Allison Rosen, the interviewer, closes with the observation, “So it’s like global sibling rivalry” and Carolla responds, “That’s what it is. It’s as old as the Bible.”

Enter the consciousness, and the reference point, we need to have about where we are. I am always a bit surprised when I hear someone say that there is no “playbook” or “manual” for living life. Of course, there is. It’s just that most people don’t like some of the advice (or “rules” if you like) and so they dismiss the work in its entirety.

The Old Testament, or Torah as I know it, sets forth the problem and sets it forth early. Cain and Abel. Isaac and Ishmael. Esau and Jacob. Shoots from the same stalk yet one envious of the others portion. Envious to the point of a willingness to destroy…and greedy to boot.

Carolla is right, but for his poor choice of vocabulary. Look around and what you see, from the “99%’ers” to the Islamist terrorists, to the multinational and agri-corporations is envy and greed. More is never enough, it seems. And if someone has “more”…even if they have attained it rightfully through just means and hard work, well…then let’s just destroy them and what they have. It’s positively Biblical in origin. Fortunately, so is the solution.

Do not covert anything that is thy neighbors.

We are all born with our “portion.” It makes no sense, and is an egregious waste of time, to resent someone else for theirs. Make the best of yours. Be grateful for what you have, accepting of what is, joyful for the gift of life, and enthusiastic for possibility. Gratitude, acceptance, joy and enthusiasm negate envy and greed.

Then, with all that spare time formerly used to begrudge and destroy, go about bettering yourself and the world around you. It’s a much better strategy. By the way, that strategy is in the manual.

“Behold I have placed before you today that which is life and that which is good; that which is death and that which is evil… And you shall choose Life, in order that you and your children shall live” [Devarim/Deuteronomy 30:15-19].

 

You’d think we were wiser, or at least smarter, than to believe that everything is fine just because Thanksgiving sales were up and the DOW Jones reacted positively to that fact. You’d think.

It astonishes me how many people remain asleep…unconscious…unaware. And how many others are living in a world of denial. I understand the tendency to bury one’s head in the sand, so to speak, in the face of so much bad news and uncertainty. Admittedly, these are trying times.

But denial never gets you anything other than delayed truth. It doesn’t obliterate it.

Here’s my latest take on fear. It’s been the tool of choice for controlling the majority of people on earth for, at least, the last 5000 years. I think it’s time we stopped buying into the illusion that energy is scarce and costly, that remedies for illness are limited to choices predetermined by a few and sanctioned by government, that politicians need be corrupt and we need to accept this as a given, and that corporations and banks need to be insatiable entities satisfying their endless hunger for money and control at the expense of those who reply upon their services and trust in their good intentions.

Energy is free. It’s in the air…the “space” all around us and extracting it has gotten everyone discredited who ever proved that to be true. Buddhism, and even physics, assert that out of “no-thing-ness,” or the void, came everything. Well, if there is nothing in the void, then it’s devoid of light, also. So light is not the Source of all that is… darkness is. And darkness is not a bad thing. Its no-thing and holds the potential from which every-thing manifests.

For these past 5000 plus years we have been living under the fear-based illusion that to break the rules gets you cast into hell (the abyss), or prison, or just plain outcast from mainstream society. As if the abyss is bad. I would ask you consider that the very thing we have been told to fear… the dark, the unknown, the “other”… is, in fact, the Source of true power. And those who have known this truth, in both religions and governments worldwide, have used that illusion to manipulate us with fear-based thinking for most of human history.

Wake up! Now! Fear is a tool to control you. That’s why there is so much “bad” news. That’s why economies are collapsing. The insatiable individuals and companies that have run our reality by fear are panicked. They are desperate and the only way they can hang on to their power is to make certain you are more frightened than you’ve ever been in your entire life.

It’s a game. Its not real. Refuse to play. Step outside the box. Follow your own inner guidance. Link up with like-minded people and stay the course. We are on the threshold of a brave new world and it’s not one ruled by one world government. It’s a world imagined by billions of individual, creative, compassionate souls who have awakened to say:

Enough.

 

Nature has a way of balancing things out and making quick friends of entrenched adversaries.  When tsunamis, earthquakes or any type of natural disaster strike a nation, it is instructive to see how the peoples of the world come together to offer aid. New Orleans, Haiti, India, Chile… these were but a few of the geographic regions that experienced natural disasters where our differences were transcended by our humanity. Or, as I prefer to think of it, our Oneness.

Let’s pray that Turkey can move beyond its political and religious agendas to rethink its decline today of the medical and humanitarian assistance Israel has offered following the devastating earthquake just suffered there.  It is hard for me to believe that anyone, or any nation’s leaders, would deny themselves some of the nearest and best medical, military and technological aid on political or religious grounds. In fact I would have to question the politics or the religion of any group of people who would allow their own to suffer and die rather than accept the outstretched hand of a neighbor whose intentions are heartfelt.

Perhaps Turkey and the world in general, should consider that what we have failed to do of our own Free Will may now be imposed upon us in a most distasteful way by the Earth itself.  When we accept that we are powerless to oppose the full force of Nature unleashed… and that our only hope during such moments and their aftermath is our support of one another…perhaps we will rethink the wisdom of so much division and hatred and contemplate a new strategy whereby we pull together rather than apart.

If not, like children, we may have to learn the hard way. Turkey certainly is.

Yes, it would be easy (and I suspect welcome) to blast the media and politicians for the hurricane Irene hype in light of the ultimate reality.  Should I be misunderstood, allow me to say from the outset here that loss of even one life and obvious property damage is not to be demeaned or dismissed.  They are both events that will evoke sadness and necessitate prolonged recovery.

This is about our reaction to the hype.

While its never easy to gauge, in advance, the potential damage from a hurricane such as the size of Irene, the technology available to us now to disseminate information makes it not only possible to spread good news but bad news as well. Not to mention fear… and spread fear they did.  Then we helped by allowing fear to run away with us.

I saw people stocking up on perishables, such as eggs and milk, when the projection was for the loss of electricity. Hello? I also saw people, literally, walking in circles in supermarkets and box stores who had no idea what to buy. They were simply following a line of thinking initiated by former President George W. Bush following the 911 attacks: Support the economy.  As if accumulating more material things could somehow stave off disaster or provide protection.

Then there were those people who refused to participate. At least they refused to participate in the fear. Bravo for them.

I’d like to believe I fell somewhere in the middle. I shopped for some extra canned food; made sure I had batteries for my flashlights and radio, and secured my basement windows from possible overflow flooding.  Then I kicked back and got on with life.  So while I had respect for Nature’s power, I didn’t have much for the media or the politicians.

I think it’s the choice to come from one’s lower self or Higher Self.  Fear is the great manipulative tool used for centuries by those in positions of power. Unfortunately, we have become so accustomed to re-acting to it that we fail to act from a place of thoughtful reflection and focus.

In Judaism, the holiday of Sukkot is one wherein Jews build a temporary shelter, or “sukkah” in which they are commanded to eat their meals and sleep for the duration of the holiday. Why?  As a reminder that for 40 years, against all odds and in the total absence of all things material, they wandered safely through the desert and survived.

To remember protection comes from God.

So, I think Irene has been instructive and if we are wise we will learn accordingly.

1. The media prospers on fear.
2. The politicians cover their rears.
3. We are manipulated by fear.
4. Reacting is not productive or helpful.
5. Our Higher Selves will guide us in the right direction.
6. God takes care of the rest.

Also, let each of us reach out with some form of assistance to anyone who suffered loss from Irene.

That, too, is our Higher Selves.