Holidays

Thanksgiving is now over. The shopping season is in full swing. For me, the end of Thanksgiving - and the approach of my birthday - marks the start of the holiday season.

Christmas is one of my favorite holidays. I used to hate it, with all of its commercialism and the almost debilitating optimism oozing out of every Christmas Carol I heard on a constant basis. The older I get, however, the more I seem to enjoy this holiday season. It helps lessen the depression I struggle with throughout the rest of the year. The more I let the positivity of the spirit of the season influence me, the more it helps me to give myself permission to be happy and actually enjoy life. As I become more spiritually aware, it's also a time for me to renew my spiritual practices and reconnect with my spirituality. The eclectic in me has tended, for the last few years, to experiment with spiritual practices and holiday observances during this time of year, as a way to explore my own spirituality and beliefs.

A few years ago, I stumbled upon a Menorah and accompanying candles at a local Christian bookstore (my guess is to accommodate the Messianic Jews of the area). As a result, for a couple of years I experimented with celebrating my own interpretation of Hanukkah , as a festival of lights and symbolizing determination. I found, however, that I did not spiritually or emotionally connect with the practice at all, and therefore I now have a Menorah I don't know what to do with. Although, I believe, I do still have my Hanukkah printouts in my Grimoire. Never hurts to have the information.

This year, I will be, of course, celebrating Christmas, and its predecessor, Advent.  I love Advent, as it is a time to prepare myself spiritually for Christmas, as well as balancing out the commercialism that can overtake this time of year leading up to Christmas. This year, I will be utilizing Advent readings from my pocket copy of the Book of Common Prayer , used in the Episcopal church, as well as the weekly readings of The Gnosis Archive , an online resources for those like myself who are drawn to Gnosticism and consider themselves Gnostics.

Also, as someone who attempts to engage in nature spirituality and honor nature, I am planning to do something to recognize Yule , which typically falls between December 20-22. I don't know exactly what will be done yet, whether it will be a simple meditation alone outside, or a full-blown ritual, but I plan to somehow recognize the holiday.

Finally, as I get older, and am going back into a contemplative stage, I find myself being drawn back to Unitarian Universalism. I am being active again in their online "congregation" and have enjoyed watching a couple of their archived online services via livestream, as they have begun having online Youtube video style weekly "online church services". I'm still happy with my current United Church of Christ church, but I find this sort of supplements it. In any case, UUs have their own holiday of sorts, which has only taken root in the last few years. It is called Chalica, and it is a 7-day celebration, beginning the first Monday of December. It's sort of a UU equivalent of Hanukkah or Kwanzaa. As UUism is guided not by dogma or theology regarding deity, but by their 7 Principles, the idea is for the celebrant to, on each day, light a candle and in some way meditate on and remember that day's principle - i.e. on the day dedicated to the "inherent worth and dignity of every person", find a way to make amends with someone whom you have had difficulty getting along with.

I just hope that it brings some positivity and calm back into my mind. God knows 2013 has been pretty much one of the weirdest, most eventful years I've ever had in my life. I need some balance.

Christmas

The last couple of days have been somewhat contemplative for me, as Christmas often is.

Friday I went to the Christmas party for my mom's side of the family. It was actually pretty decent. Although I couldn't help but feel amused that an aunt and uncle got me an ice scraper as a gift. Albeit a very nice one. I live in a part of the country where generally, ice only exists in refrigerator freezers. In all fairness, they also got one for my cousin. My cousin who doesn't drive and doesn't own a car.

Saturday, we went to a local park, which had Christmas lights up for display. It wasn't as good as the light displays in the park I go to every year in South Carolina, but it was still fun. On the way home, we stopped by a house that had an amazing light display, which I was able to video:

This morning, we had the Christmas gathering for my dad's side of the family, which was just his older brother and sister. They came to my parents' house, and we had breakfast, and we went to church.

Church with my fundamentalist family usually bores and frustrates me. Today, however, I just felt sad for them. The sermon was entitled "When God Came to Earth", and was..... well, what would be expected at a conservative church with a sermon of that title. I just kept thinking, "Why can't they understand that God never "left" Earth? Why can't they see that God is all around us, in everything we see, and within ourselves?" It saddens me that they can't see what a beautiful creation this is, and that God isn't just some stodgy guy in the heavens watching us with disdain, unless we think and believe The Right Things. No wonder we as a species are so war-torn, domineering, and destructive - we have no collective self-esteem or self-worth.

After church, we came back to my house and opened gifts. Then went to my aunt's house for lunch/dinner and opening gifts. Then we came back home and watched Christmas movies. I got some good movies, some not so good movies, some cologne, and a nice jacket. All in all, it wasn't a bad holiday. Now we'll see how I'll survive the rest of the week!

Falling into Place

There are those rare moments in life where, even if you're in a transitional period of life, things just seem to fall into place, and life seems to have a theme of sorts.

The full moon Saturday was amazing. I went to the beach and, although it was cold, the view was beautiful. I love the beach at night. The way the moon sparkled over the water. The sand cold beneath my toes. I barely even needed my keychain flashlight. It filled me with energy. Later that night, I performed a spell to aid my efforts in obtaining an internship for the next school year - I've been having some difficulties narrowing down my options, and further in getting in touch with the organizations in order to set up interviews (my school's procedures for getting an internship are basically the same as for getting a job - call the place, set up an interview, they say "yes" or "no). I don't do spellwork very often; I've noticed that when I try to force it, the words just won't come to me, kind of a spiritual writer's block, so to speak. But when the timing is right, I have no trouble coming up with the right words, materials to use, etc. It's like the Universe's way of telling me that the time, the energies, are just right. And, typically, the full moon is, after all, thought to be a very powerful time for those on the mystical spiritual paths.

Sunday was Ostara. The Spring Equinox. It seemed fitting that I was the churchmember scheduled to provide the Scripture reading for the day - my church, a member of the United Church of Christ denomination, places heavy emphasis on lay involvement, and not simply following the minister. The scripture for today likewise included one of my favorite Psalms - Psalms 121:

1I lift up my eyes to the hills— from where will my help come?
2My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.
3He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber.
4He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
5The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade at your right hand.
6The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.
7The Lord will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life.
8The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time on and forevermore.

This, to me, is not saying we don't have bad things that happen to us. God knows I've been through a fair amount of hell in my 28 years of living. But Pleroma will not leave me. The Divine Spark that is within me, that is within every living creature, every rock, every drop of water, is still there. Bad things happen to good people (and innocent animals, and so forth), and when that happens, I remember that I'm part of Something bigger than myself, and that I will come out of the situation a stronger person having survived it.

For Lent, the Celtic Spirituality group at church, of which I am a part, is holding a meditation service on Sundays before Conversations in Faith. The meditation service is a short time of responsive readings, singing, Irish meditation music (a woman playing a harp), with the leader reading a passage on a chosen topic. The theme for today was "New Beginnings". It brought to mind not only the new beginnings symbolized by the holiday - the first day of Spring - but also the preparations I am making for a new school year that is to come soon. The theme for today's Conversations in Faith discussion was compassion, and how can we have compassion for others, as well as ourselves? The teaching in church was, likewise, on love. Love your neighbor as yourself. Who is your neighbor? Everyone. Everything.

After church I went to a local park and read a chapter out of the book we are reading in the Celtic Spirituality group, before going and buying an amazing (so far) new digital camera. Tonight, to finish off the day's activities, I held a solitary Ostara/Spring Equinox ritual that I found from a Pagan About.com newsletter I subscribe to. It was very calming, and focused on the balance between light and dark, winter and summer, old and new. Ostara is a time of balance, so such things should be the focus on this holiday. I thought of all the things I want to do, but don't seem to know how or where to start. I want to recycle, but the county I live in has virtually no recycling program - if we want to recycle, we have to take it to the recycling plant ourselves, there is no curbside pickup like with trash. I want to eat healthier and buy more local, but the only places I am aware of are our local grocery stores, which, while they do have good local/organic options, I just don't know recipes or how to actually go about cooking the food, nor do I have time to learn very much right now, between work, class, and internship, all three consisting of separate schedules. I want to experiment with an indoor/windowsill garden, similar to what many people who live in more urban areas do, but I'm lucky if I remember to adequately and consistently remember to water the one houseplant that I do have. I know I have the potential, and am getting better at the self-discipline. I just also know I have a tendency to take too much on, and end up not doing any of it as well as I could have. So I think these things are goals I'm going to try to keep in mind for "after graduation", to bring greater focus on these spiritual growth practices, once I have achieved my academic goals. Things seemed to be falling into place intellectually/emotionally this weekend; maybe someday things will fall into place for me to put it all into practice.

The Year in Review

Coming soon, I'm adding a couple of more links, and I have a couple of articles I want to comment on. Also, I finally finished The Complete Idiot's Guide to Zen Living, and will be posting a book review. For tonight, however, I want to follow a bit of a tradition of mine and do a bit of a 2010 in review post.

The first two months of the year, I spent with a head cold-turned-sinus infection-turned-bronchitis. I took antibiotics, which of course made me worse. Easter weekend I spent in the Emergency Room with a horrible stomach virus, with a roommate who, as I heard whilst drifting in and out of consciousness, was a homeless guy who had supposedly been slipped crack. Surprisingly enough, I didn't really get sick the rest of 2010, aside from another head cold in August. My dad and sister are currently sick though, so here's a little *knock on wood* that I don't catch that before I go back to the real world on Tuesday.

School was hell. By the end of Spring Semester 2010, my GPA was down to a 2.9. I need a 3.0 to remain in school. I retook one of my classes that summer and brought it up to a 3.0 even. For the Fall Semester, I somehow managed to bring it up to a 3.1 - I made a B in the class I thought would be my easy A, an A in the class I thought I would do terrible in, and of course had no problems with my grade for the internship. My internship started in August of 2010, and it's been busy as hell, with a caseload that seems to me to be very large for an intern. I feel bad complaining about it sometimes, and try to work it out, since they seem to really like me, and my supervisor told me that she normally only gives interns a caseload 1 case because that's all they can handle, but I do so well, so she's given me the 6ish I have now. On top of that, the most recent incidence of changing my caseload/reassigning clients, she actually worked the caseload around 4 or 5 different times to keep from having to take me away from my cerebral palsy client, because she said I've connected with that kid and his foster family in a way that is very unusual for that particular family, who usually are kind of skeptical with the caseworkers that work with them. This unnerves me some, because it seems that when people start bragging too much about my capabilities, or complimenting me too much, that's when I start doing worse, because even now, I just don't know how to handle that kind of positive attention.

Work has also been crazy. One of the hardest decisions I made was quitting my part-time job in June 2010, to give more time for school endeavors. A few colleagues from that job also work at my current place of employment, and as recently as November, they have mentioned the kids missing me and asking about me. Indeed, on my birthday, a kid and his roommates called me and left me a voicemail telling me happy birthday. A month after quitting the part-time job, in July, I went part-time at the full-time job. This means I basically make my own calendar of availability, allowing for even more time for school and working just enough to pay the bills.

Socially, my life has continued to mostly be on hold. I didn't really interact with any of my classmates outside of group projects/assignments and an occasional lunch together between classes. Scheduling didn't allow me to see most of my work friends outside of work, and most of my closer ones have quit the job at this point anyways. I had a total of 3 dates during the year, all of which seem to have turned out to be what I call "one hit wonders" - having a date, and then never acknowledging my existence again, or at least only rarely doing so. On a positive note, I do have a very good work friend who has become more of a travel/activity partner, which makes things more fun. Also, I saw one of my best friends for the first time in six years.

Here's to hoping that 2011 continues the trend of actually having good (or at least, not devastatingly bad) years, something that hasn't really happened since 2006. Happy New Year's, everyone!  

Perfect Storm

 Well, this Christmas went better than Christmas has in quite a few years. Just as I posted the previous entry noting that I seem to recognize the nature-centric elements of the holiday a bit more this year than usual, the nature spirits seem to have appeared to say hello and present me with gifts of their own.


First, was the occurrence Christmas Eve night/Christmas Day morning, around midnight. I was online in the family room (where my parents' computer is located) when my mom called me to the window of my bedroom. There, trotting around the Nativity scene and trying to get into the birdfeeder, were at least six or seven beautiful deer, right there next to my bedroom window. I watched them for at least ten or fifteen minutes before they wandered off.

Christmas morning went smoothly. We had breakfast and opened gifts at my parents' house, followed by lunch and gifts at my aunt's house. I will probably be spending the remainder of my vacation (until Jan 4) being generally unproductive and watching the movies I got for Christmas, and catching up on reading. At around 9:00AM it began snowing. Within the hour, the ground was covered in snow, and by the end of the day it was up to almost my ankles, if not higher. We've gotten snow before or after Christmas before, but the news stations report that this is the first time we've had a large amount of snow fall on Christmas Day since 1947. I took quite a few pictures, some of which I may post here once I get back to my computer and uploaded. I walked around outside several times, taking in the scenery and meditating and praying to the beauty of it all. I wandered to a section of what's left of the small forest behind the house, and came across what was once a small "tree house" that my sister and I used to play in as little kids. I use that term loosely, because as my sister is disabled, the treehouse is a treehouse in the sense that it is a bunch of plywood nailed around tree trunks. At that time I was into shows like "Where in the World is Carmen San Diego?", and the big thing for us was to pretend we were secret agents, and the treehouse was our headquarters. I was somewhat saddened to see that the structure had finally collapsed on itself with age. By this time, my mom had joined me, and we dug through to see what could be found. All that was still remotely intact was my sister's old Pocahontas bookbag, which contained some of her old toys and two diaries. One was locked; the other had only been written in on one page, dated, coincidentally, December 25 - we found it on the exact anniversary of its first usage. It had been given to her by our now deceased grandmother, who died when I was in 9th grade, which would put this entry probably about 3-4 years prior. 

In all honesty, I'm hoping these are all omens of some sort for a good 2011. God knows I need a really good year for a change.

Christmas

 One thing I like to do around holidays, particularly Christmas and Easter, is, strangely enough, watch documentaries on the History Channel, Discovery Channel, etc., about whatever holiday is at hand.

One particular documentary I saw today (not for the first time) discussed the history behind the different aspects of the Nativity story, and the scientific plausibility of the various elements. Now, this time watching it, I was watching it with my literalist Christian mother, as I am in North Carolina visiting family for the holidays. All whilst hearing the various theologians discuss how the virgin birth is a metaphor for this-and-that and not historically accurate (I am inclined to agree), I hear my mom asking me "you don't really believe what they're saying, right?" and lamenting "If you don't believe in the virgin birth, you may as well just not even bother with any of it". As can be imagined, I find holidays very difficult with my family, no matter how much I love them. I struggle to come up with ways the more mainstream religious holidays that I include in my spiritual practice can have meaning to me as a Gnostic Druid, whilst simultaneously celebrating them with a family I seem to have only genetics and family history in common with. At times I feel like I'm being a fake, for not being forthcoming about the true extent of my religious beliefs as of current - instead I smile and nod and go along with it, telling myself that I only see them a few times a year and everybody does basically the same thing over the holidays. I answer questions only when directly asked (such as, incidentally, just a few minutes ago, when my mom asked about The Infancy Gospel of James, after hearing about it in the documentary), or in other cases such as her "Do you really believe this?" accusatory question, I just answer vaguely or don't even acknowledge I heard her, pretending to be absorbed in the book/tv show/whatever. Not exactly healthy confrontational skills, I know.

Nonetheless, Christmas this year does have a different "feel" to it than some years past, as it were. I seem to be more aware of the nature symbolism behind the traditions - the Christmas tree as a symbol of life in the death of winter; the lights as a symbol of the coming light in the darkness of winter. I feel more connected to the nature aspects of the holiday and the history behind the traditions. As such, it is becoming a more meaningful holiday to me this year than it has since I first began this path (even though, unfortunately, on the Winter Solstice I held little celebration, doing so a day late, and could not see the eclipse very well). I even read my current favorite version of the Christmas story, the aforementioned Infancy Gospel of James  online.

I'm not yet sure why I like this version so much. Perhaps because it is different from the standard version of the Christmas story that we read every year in the canonical Bible, quoted in my favorite Charlie Brown Christmas special. In addition to that, it's the first Infancy Gospel I have finally had the chance to read in its entirety.  This version begins with Anna, Mary's mother, lamenting that she has not had children, and she and her husband are old. An angel appears to her, and she is told she would conceive. Of course, she then has Mary. A couple of more stories regarding Mary in the temple and things that show her specialness compared to other girls, and Joseph not wanting to marry her because of her age, and the fact that he is older and has children from a previous marriage. But he does take her in, she is visited by Gabriel, etc. etc. I think my favorite passage, probably due to how different it is from anything else I'd heard or read up to this point, is when Joseph is looking for a midwife while Mary is in labor in a cave, as quoted in this post:

Now I Joseph was walking, and I walked not. And I looked up to the air and saw the air in amazement. And I looked up unto the pole of the heaven and saw it standing still, and the fowls of the heaven without motion. And I looked upon the earth and saw a dish set, and workmen lying by it, and their hands were in the dish: and they that were chewing chewed not, and they that were lifting the food lifted it not, and they that put it to their mouth put it not thereto, but the faces of all of them were looking upward. And behold there were sheep being driven, and they went not forward but stood still; and the shepherd lifted his hand to smite them with his staff, and his hand remained up. And I looked upon the stream of the river and saw the mouths of the kids upon the water and they drank not. And of a sudden all things moved onward in their course.

In other words, Pleroma, the True God, stopped time so that Joseph could find a midwife before Jesus' birth. It goes on to say that the midwife went to get a second midwife, Salome, to assist, and Salome disbelieved the first midwife's story about Mary, so when she arrived she "tested God". As a result, her hand falls off. She prays for forgiveness and is healed.

I think to me, just like the mainstream versions, this version serves as a metaphor of Pleroma's love for us, for the Divinity within us, and the importance of Jesus as a Wayshower, alongside Buddha, Krishna, and other prophets from all religions. To me, they all lead to the same Source, and Christmas is the celebration of just one path, celebrated alongside a commemoration of the natural world around us near the Winter Solstice, a conjunction of the spiritual and material. So, on that note, I hope everyone had a Merry Yule and has a Merry Christmas!

Celebrations

December is a time for holidays. It seems like every religion celebrates some kind of coming of light in the dark of winter, in or around this time of year. The liturgical/religious calendars I follow have two sets of holidays:
 
- the Gnostic calendar, as laid out in the book Living Gnosticism, includes Christmas. As a further Christian extension of this, I also celebrate Advent, which began this year on November 28th. There are Advent meditations for each Sunday listed in The Gnosis Archive, as well as a daily Advent devotional I printed out from The Unitarian Universalist Christian Fellowship,

- The Pagan/Druidic Calendar lists December 21 as Yule, or the Pagan equivalent of Christmas. It is the official first day of winter, and anticipates the return of spring and warmth.

In addition, on occasion I may feel drawn to a holiday of another religion that I may want to experiment with. It is in this vein that I celebrate my inner eclectic/Unitarian Universalist, and experiment with such holidays for approximately 3 years. My logic is that if I feel drawn to it to the point of feeling compelled to experiment with it, then 3 years will give me enough time to celebrate it, research the meaning behind it and various customs for it, and decide if I can relate to it enough to continue on and make it part of my "official" religious calendar. This year, I have two:

- Chalica = a recently invented (as in, around 2005ish) Unitarian-Universalist specific holiday. Modeled after Hannukah and Kwanzaa, it is a seven day long celebration. On each day the celebrant lights a candle honoring each of the 7 Principles of Unitarian-Universalism. It begins on the first Monday of December. For example, Monday will honor the first Principle (the inherent worth and dignity of every person), Tuesday the 2nd Principle, etc. This is my 2nd year experimenting with Chalica. So far, I feel that I relate to it quite well. Many of its' practices so far include giving some kind of gift to someone that represents that day's principle, and I don't really have anyone to give gifts to, and right now I also have inadequate time to be more creative in other external expressions of the holiday. So, I light the candle for the day, and try to keep that Principle in mind when I go about the day's activities. Today was particularly difficult, as my caseload at the internship was shifted around so much I don't really know who my caseload is at this point, and on top of that, they did all this the day before my technical last day with them until January. The positive thing about this holiday is that in typical UU fashion, there is no official way to celebrate it, or even any requirement to celebrate it. It is growing in popularity among UUs and the closest to an 'official' holiday they've ever had. Many UUs are celebrating it along with whatever other religion-specific holidays they may practice. As such, if I feel compelled to celebrate it in some way, how I do so is completely up to me. In any case, so far it looks as though this will become an official holiday for me.

- Hannukah - a couple of years ago, while in a Christian bookstore Christmas shopping for family, I came across a menorah. I felt drawn to it, as I'm interested in Jewish culture and at the time I was briefly looking more into Kabbalah (which I will look into again once I get to that section of my reading list and have more time), so I bought it. This is also my 2nd year experimenting with this one. On a small level, I feel I can relate to the overall message of the holiday - celebrating light in the darkness; miracles when you feel you're at the end of your resources and have done all you can; overcoming oppression. However, ways to celebrate it are so cultural specific, and I'm not a Jew (and the last Jew I dated was a cultural, rather than practicing, Jew), so I feel that I may not be able to relate to it in a way that I feel I would need to in order to keep it in my list of practices. So, I will continue the rest of this year, and next year, to complete my "3 year rule", but if I don't feel any different after that, I will acknowledge and appreciate it for the beautiful holiday that it is, and say goodbye to it.

To finish, here is a picture of my new seasonal altar. In the center is my Advent wreath. To the right, of course, is the menorah. And to the left, a chalice candleholder with a tealight candle inside, for Chalica. Under it is a meditation board, tarot deck, and oracle card deck.

Thanksgiving

 Tuesday night, a friend and I went to an interfaith service at a local Conservative Jewish synagogue, sponsored by the local Christian-Jewish Council. It was quite interesting. There were responsive readings, prayers, and readings from the Jewish prayerbook, the Siddur. Although it wasn't a passage that was read, one that I glanced at which caught my eye. It is Pirkei Avot 1:14, which states:

"Hillel used to say: If I am not for myself who will be for me? Yet, if I am for myself only, what am I? And if not now, when?"

In a way, it fits with the holiday, for me. It talks about helping others, and standing up for others. It reminds me of how thankful I am to have had friends over the years who have helped me through some very dark times; and likewise I have tried to be there for them as well. Yes, my life isn't quite where I want it to be at the moment, as can probably be gathered in previous posts. But it could be a lot worse off as well!

Happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate it!

Lughnasadh

August 1 marked the holiday of Lughnasadh in the Pagan/earth-centered holiday calendar. It is the halfway point between summer and autumn. The first harvest.

There is a ritual outlined in one of my Druidry books that I adapted for the holiday, but I didn't do it this year, due to fatigue and packing for a much needed vacation, which is coming up on Tuesday. But I've tried to focus on the meaning of the holiday in modern times, in any case - for me, a non-agrarian-yet-naturecentric-spiritual person, it's about looking at what you've accomplished this year, and how that is coming to fruition. And in spite of two months of bronchitis, a reaction to the accompanying antibiotics, a bad stomach virus, and pretty much exhaustion, I have accomplished quite a bit. I worked two jobs the first half of the year, in addition to school. This took a toll on my academics, so I ended up on academic probation. I quit one job and re-took a class, bringing up my GPA back to a 3.0. I'm really going to have to bust my ass off to keep it though, and I'm still not sure how I'm going to juggle it all. I'm now part-time at the current workplace, so that I can basically make my own schedule. I still have to work enough to pay the bills, though, and I'll have Saturday classes and my first internship to balance as well. I'm nervous, but today's(well, technically yesterday) holiday serves to remind me that it's all going somewhere in the end.

St. Joseph of Arimethea

Page 82 of Jordan Stratford's book, Living Gnosticism:An Ancient Way of Knowing, from which I derive my Gnostic liturgical/holiday calendar, lists today, July 31, as the day to honor Joseph of Arimethea. Joseph is the one thought to have donated his tomb to Jesus after his crucifixion. Western churches celebrate his day in March, while the Eastern traditions, like the Gnostic one I derive my calendar from, celebrate it today. Legends have also tied him to the Holy Grail, and it seems to be in this respect that the aforementioned book honors him.

But what is this Holy Grail? The DaVinci Code, similar to the book Holy Blood, Holy Grail, theorizes that it symbolizes the unity of male and female, the Goddess, as well as the secret that Jesus had a child, and therefore a family tree still in existence. To me, it further symbolizes the secret knowledge of the God within. We all have our "holy grails", those things which are our dreams, our life purposes, the seemingly unattainable goals. For me, it is summed up perfectly in the words of Jordan Stratford's book:

May my house be at peace in this time of war. May I have a voice in this time of oppressive silence. May I have love in this time of immense loneliness. May I have justice in this time of cruelty, democracy in this age of despots.

Peace. Internal and external. That is what I long for, ultimately. To be happy with who I am as a person. To come to terms with the things I have been through in life, and be prepared for things I will inevitably go through as this life progresses. Being okay with myself even on days I feel lonely and feel I have no friends, no close family, no potential romantic interests. Peace that everything is going to be okay. I know I'm learning that peace, when I sit in my car on break at work, de-stressing from the usual strange happenings, and feel instantly calm when I see a raccoon near the dumpster, or two owls flittling through the trees, catching mice on the ground. Or when I am put into awkward positions by my most incompetent co-worker, who tries to make me look like the bad guy because I'm the one actually enforcing the daily rules and schedule, and actually tries to basically turn the kids against me - and then has the nerve to say I'm not running group therapy very well because she's not doing her job of helping establish control of the kids' behaviors so I can gather my thoughts for the day's topic. Things like this happen, and yet I'm not as angry as I normally would be, or at least the anger doesn't last nearly as long as it used to.

Interestingly enough, I happened to watch a movie on my Netflix Rental Queue called Ink. It's an indie movie, and I'd never heard of it, but as I was browsing the movies you could instantly watch on your Wii or computer, it caught my eye. I immediately had to order it on Amazon, because although I didn't get to watch it very closely for the last half of the movie, what I did get to watch immediately resonated with me. In it, an overstressed businessman is suffering from depression and loneliness and guilt. His estranged elementary-aged daughter, who lives with his in-laws, is put into a coma. In reality, both conditions are a fight amongst two sets of spiritual beings - Storytellers, who endow peoples' dreams with hope and positivity and love, and Incubi, who torment people with nightmares and hopelessness. In a dream,a kind of middle character, Ink, who kidnaps the little girl's soul in an attempt to purchase his way into the graces of the Incubi - this spiritual abduction is the source of her coma. The Storytellers, aided by a mysterious blind Pathfinder, are on a quest to save her and restore her to life.

One of the scenes that stuck out to me, perhaps partly because it was one of the few later scenes I was able to focus on(my housemate is dog-sitting, and the arrival of the dog was causing a bit of a stir), is when the father is in a car, unconscious after a car accident. An Incubi is then standing beside him. If I remember correctly, the Incubus is telling him not to wake up, that his life is worthless, things along those lines. A Storyteller appears and chases the Incubus away. She then comes to the unconscious man and touches his forehead. She begins showing him memories of his first date with his wife, and the happy years of their marriage. Throughout, she reminds him: "It's going to be okay, John. In the end, everything is going to be okay."

Today is a day to remember: in the end, it's all going to work out. Everything will be okay.

The Feast of the Magdalene

According to Jordan Stratford's work, Living Gnosticism:An Ancient Way of Knowing, one of my favorite "Gnosticism 101" books and still my primary resource into the Gnostic liturgical calendar, July 22 is the Feast of the Magdalene. In his book, on page 81, he states:

The identification with Mary Magdalene is extremely popular among contemporary Gnostics. As the first of the apostles to witness of the Resurrection, she is seen as co-equal with Christ and the first to truly understand the post-incarnational aspect of the Logos. In this role of initiated initiator, she is celebrated as an aspect of Sophia Herself.

 Poor Mary Magdalene. She has gone through so much in her history, ever since she was equated with a prostitute, not by the Bible itself, but by Pope Gregory the Great, in the sixth century.

But then, when the Gnostic scriptures were discovered, It turned out that there was a Gospel, the Gospel of Mary, dedicated to her, which revere her as Christ's most beloved. Indeed, many now believe that the "beloved disciple" in John was originally a reference to her before being edited by patriarchical scribes later on. And of course, books such as The Da Vinci Code brought to public eye, the view that she was married to Jesus and that they had children, something that I personally have no trouble believing in the possibility of.

Now, in many Gnostic circles, as mentioned in the above quote from Stratford's book, Mary Magdalene is seen as a sort of Christian Goddess, an incarnation of the Sophia, along with Isis, Asherah, and others. The concept of the Goddess is something that has been in my mind lately, and will likely be the topic of an upcoming blog.

So, in celebration of today's liturgical holiday, I close with the Gospel readings from today's meditation in The Gnosis Archive. From the Gospel of Luke:

And behold a woman in the city, which was a harlot, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisees house brought an alabaster box of ointment. And she stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment. When the Pharisee which had bidden him saw it, he spake within himself: This man if he were a prophet, would have known who and what manner of woman this is that toucheth him; for she is a harlot. And Jesus turned to the woman, and said unto Simon the Pharisee: Seest thou this woman? I entered into thine house, thou gavest me no water for my feet; but she hath washed my feet with tears, and wiped them with the hair of her head. Thou gavest me no kiss; but this woman hath not ceased to kiss my feet. My head with oil thou didst not anoint; but this woman hath anointed my feet with ointment. Wherefore I say unto thee: Her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much.

And from the Gospel of Phillip:

The Sophia whom they call barren is the mother of the angels. And the consort of Christ is Mary Magdalen. The Lord loved Mary more than all the disciples and kissed her on her mouth often. The others said to him: ‘Why do you love her more than all of us?’ The Saviour answered and said to them: ‘Why do I not love you like her?’ There were three who walked with the Lord at all times, Mary his mother, and her sister and Magdalene, whom they called his consort. For Mary was his sister and his mother and his consort.