Category Archives: Poetry

Echoes

my POD (Poem Of the Day)

~I hear echoes in vibration
Sculpting – unfolding – dematerializing –
Reforming forces
Rising in the sap of ancient trees
Up building
Where my tongue curls
Over words shot thru with bones of nimble Sun
& Crystalline structures that thrust the flowers
Into a cold field of refracted light

~hag

astronomy.com

6 February 2023 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Draco the dragon winds his way beneath the Little Dipper in the north shortly after sunset tonight. The Dragon’s head is marked by the asterism the Lozenge, which lies to the lower left (southeast) of the Litter Dipper’s bowl just after dark. There is a short dark-sky window in the hour between sunset and moonrise, so take advantage of it if you can.

If you look along the Dragon’s body as it curls beneath Ursa Minor, you’ll reach Thuban (Alpha [α] Draconis) west of the Lozenge. This star was once the North Star, sitting close to Earth’s Celestial Pole as the sky appeared to spin around it. That honor now belongs to Polaris in Ursa Minor — the change is due to the fact that Earth’s rotational axis wobbles, or precesses, over the course of about 25,000 years. As the axis moves, it points at various stars in the sky at different times, so our North Star can change over the course of thousands of years.

Sunrise: 7:04 A.M.
Sunset: 5:25 P.M.
Moonrise: 6:22 P.M.
Moonset: 7:55 A.M.
Moon Phase: Waning gibbous (99%)

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Thomas Jackson

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Image result for Burning of the Temple of Diana at Ephesus AND the Birthday of Alexander the Great
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356 -The Burning of the Temple of Diana at Ephesus AND the Birthday of Alexander the Great

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1347 – Birthday of Dorothea of Montau, the guardian of the country of the Teutonic Knights & patron saint of Prussia. Born to a wealthy farmer from Holland, she was married at the age of 16 to the swordsmith Adalbrecht of Danzig (Gdańsk), an ill-tempered man in his 40s. Almost immediately after marrying she began to experience visions. Her husband had little patience with her spiritual experiences & abused her. Later, both made pilgrimages to Cologne, Aachen, & Einsiedeln. While Dorothea, with her husband’s permission, was on pilgrimage to Rome, he died in 1389. Of their nine children eight died. The surviving daughter, Gertrud, joined the Benedictines. In the summer of 1391 Dorothea moved to Marienwerder (Kwidzyn), & with the blessing of the Teutonic Order, established a hermit’s cell against the wall of the cathedral. She never left that cell for the rest of her life. Dorothea led a very austere life. Numerous visitors sought her advice & consolation, & she had visions & revelations

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1748 – Birthday of Adam Weishaupt, German philosopher & founder of the Illuminati. After Pope Clement XIV’s suppression of the Society of Jesus in 1773, Weishaupt became a professor of canon law, a position that was held exclusively by the Jesuits until that time. In 1775 Weishaupt was introduced to the empirical philosophy of Johann Georg Heinrich Fede. Both Feder &Weishaupt would later become opponents of Kantian idealism.

“At a time, however, when there was no end of making game of and abusing secret societies, I planned to make use of this human foible for a real and worthy goal, for the benefit of people. I wished to do what the heads of the ecclesiastical and secular authorities ought to have done by virtue of their offices…” ~ Adam Weishaupt

On 1 May 1776 Weishaupt founded the “Illuminati” in the Electorate of Bavaria. He adopted the name of “Brother Spartacus” within the order. The character of the society was an elaborate network of spies & counter-spies. Each isolated cell of initiates reported to a superior, whom they did not know: a party structure that was effectively adopted by some later groups.

Weishaupt was initiated into the Masonic Lodge “Theodor zum guten Rath“, at Munich in 1777. His project of “illumination, enlightening the understanding by the sun of reason, which will dispel the clouds of superstition and of prejudice” was an unwelcome reform. He used Freemasonry to recruit for his own quasi-masonic society, with the goal of “perfecting human nature” through re-education to achieve a communal state with nature, freed of government & organized religion. Presenting their own system as pure masonry, Weishaupt & Adolph Freiherr Knigge, who organized his ritual structure, greatly expanded the secret organization.

Weishaupt’s character & intentions have been variously assessed: from those such as the Abbé Barruel & John Robison who regarded him as a ‘human devil’ & saw his mission as one of malevolent destructiveness, to those who view him as a humane & benign, albeit willful, social reformer. Writing on this topic, Dr. Tony Page comments: “Weishaupt’s plan was to educate Illuminati followers in the highest levels of humanity and morality (basing his teachings on the supremacy of Reason, allied with the spirit of the Golden Rule of not doing to others what one would not wish done to oneself), so that if Illuminati alumni subsequently attained positions of significance and power (such as in the fields of education and politics), they could exert a benevolent and uplifting influence upon society at large. His project was utopian and naively optimistic, and he himself was certainly not without flaws of character – but neither he nor his plan was evil or violent in and of themselves. It is one of the deplorable and tragic ironies of history that a man who tried to inculcate virtue, philanthropy, social justice and morality has become one of the great hate-figures of 21st-century ‘conspiracy’ thinking.

After Weishaupt’s Order of Illuminati was banned & its members dispersed, it left behind no enduring traces of an influence, not even on its own former members, who went on in the future to develop in quite different directions.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobin_(politics)

From Steve Hale: Yet, there is clear evidence that after being banned in 1784, due to the direct intervention of Count Saint Germain, who exposed the aims of the Illuminati just before his own death on February 27th of that year, that Weishaupt simply regrouped and cloaked his movement in the religious veneer of the Dominicans, as the Jacobins, who influenced the French Revolution, which began in 1789, and had Robespierre as its autocratic leader in the so-called, ‘Reign of Terror’.

Maybe Tony Page doesn’t know this part, but this kind of strategic scheming in order to uphold the aims of Freemasonry has had a long history of its efforts within the political domain for the purpose of controlling the world ever since the French Revolution, which was all about upholding the aristocracy instead of the people. America had its own version of it with the Revolutionary War.

John Robison wrote the seminal book, “Proofs of a Conspiracy”, in 1798, about the aims of the Illuminati Order which Weishaupt had created in 1776. What Robison didn’t know because it was not possible to know at the time, was that Count St. Germain, an incarnation of Christian Rosenkreutz, had exposed the order in 1784.

1891 – Birthday of Walter Johannes Stein. Stein grew up in Vienna as the son of a lawyer & a Theosophist . He studied mathematics, physics & philosophy in Vienna & received his doctorate there in 1918 with a dissertation entitled Historical-Critical Contributions to the Development of Modern Philosophy , which he had developed with the help of Rudolf Steiner . He had previously participated in the First World War as an artillery officer .

In the same year he married & campaigned for the threefolding of the social organism with writings & lectures . After their failure, he was appointed to teach German & history at the first Waldorf school in Stuttgart. To this end, he was committed to the Anthroposophical Society in Germany, from 1923 to 1928 as a board member.

In 1932 he left the Waldorf School & moved to England to work for Daniel Nicol Dunlop’s research office at the World Energy Council, founded in 1924 . After his death in 1935 he published the monthly The Present Age until the beginning of World War II .

During the war he began to work as a non-medical practitioner – he had been involved in medicine since around 1920, he was also close friends with the anthroposophical doctor Ita Wegman & his school friend Eugen Kolisko in Vienna – and held public lectures on medicine until his death in 1957 & worked on a book on the basics & perspectives of spiritually advanced medicine.

I just re-read this amazing book!

The Women at the Tomb – A Festival of Resurrection

with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, Song-Circle with Velsum,

Eurythmy – & an artistic break out session

Holy Saturday 8 April 2023

1 pm – 3pm CT a hybrid event in-person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago & on zoom

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7050174041

Meeting ID: 705 017 4041

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (map)
www.rschicago.org/donate

PRESENTS:

The Mystery of Ascension with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

This course is available on Zoom. You will be emailed a Zoom link closer to the time of the class. The course will be recorded and you will receive a link to watch it. Go to the Infinity Foundation web site to enroll

Course Number 231154 / Zoom
Date: Thursday, May 11
Time 7:00 – 8:30 PM CST
Cost $33/23 payment 10 days in advance

Gerald Shepherd

When we tune into the Cycle of the Seasons, we experience that as the Earth breathes out in the Springtime, the beings of nature reach upwards towards the heights. The longing of the human soul also strives to meet this mood of ascension, which attunes all life to the cosmic expanses.

Together we will gain insights in how to rise up to our Higher Self by participating in this harmonizing spring-dialogue between the worlds.

This reconnection between heaven & earth was prefigured in the story of Jacob’s ladder from the Old Testament. Through his dream of the ‘stairway to heaven’, Jacob gave us a prophecy in the picture of a golden ladder on which choirs of Angels traverse between the ‘Above & Below’. The Mystery of the Ascension of Christ, 40 days after the Resurrection at Easter, fulfilled Jacob’s Prophecy. Christ as the Being of Love became the living bridge connecting us to the eternal.

Through this workshop we will learn how humanity will also be transfigured in the fullness of time. The company of the Angelic Hierarchies wait for us, their younger siblings, to ascend, first of all in our thinking, to meet them in fellowship, as they work all the while by our sides.

Nancy Poer

~Vitae Sophia~A Whitsun Festival of United Soul Endeavor with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, Velsum Voices & Eurythmy

Saturday 27 May 2023 a Hybrid event in person* & on zoom

We are called to redeem the ether spheres to create an Ecclesia, a chalice for The Sophia. Then the spirit flame can spread out to become what Steiner called a “World Whitsun”, which began in earnest at the Christmas Conference. The Whitsun Festival highlights one of the greatest challenges of being human: placing our individual gifts, in right relationship within the social realm. This challenge is especially strong now during this ‘pandemic’. Our groups striving to know Spiritual Science must work together as a community, to have the possibility to create a new culture where a sacrament is possible in every encounter. Our individual strength is enhanced by weaving our gifts together, kindling our social world in conscious community.

Zoom: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/83663366670?pwd=L292UzlOR1pkZjBXSWpxK1B2b0o1dz09 Meeting ID: 836 6336 6670 / Passcode: 397593

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
*Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (map) www.rschicago.org/donate

Etherizing the Night

Thank you to all who joined us on the Longest Night of Winter Solstice for the presentation offered by Adriana Koulias. The recording & PDF of her Power Point will be posted soon on the Rudolf Steiner Branch Web Site

This POD (Poem Of the Day) was inspired by the night:

Come celebrate the unseen powers that sustain the world…
Pay reverence to what’s underneath:
The Holy column of support
The liminal benediction from above
The christened periphery
An awakened still-point within
Elusive, uncanny & darkly delicious…

Harken to inner vitality peaking
with thinking as smart as it gets
acting as if
every move is a dance…

It’s the Sun-@-Midnight time on the wheel of the year…

To participate in the grand Cosmic-cycle
this phase invites us to throb in luminescence
with soft vitality & active silence
peppering the cold acoustic with our hot breath…

Be a fluid bolt of ingenious reverence
Etherizing the righteous blending of grace & power
in communal service to the Divine “I” in every eye
As we imprint the Holy Nights with sublime intent…
~hag

22 December 2022 – “Speaking with the Stars”

Julie Labelle

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day 

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons that history has to teach.” ~Aldous Huxley

The 5th Night of Hanukkah

304 – Deathday of Saint Florian a Christian holy man, and the patron saint of Linz, Austria; chimney sweeps; soapmakers, & firefighters. The “Florian Principle” (known in German language areas as “Sankt-Florians-Prinzip”) is named after a somewhat ironic prayer to Saint Florian: “O heiliger Sankt Florian, verschon’ mein Haus, zünd’ and’re an”, equivalent to “O Holy St. Florian, please spare my house, set fire to another one”. This saying is used in German much like the English “not in my back yard“, when the speaker wants to point out that some person tries to get out of an unpleasant situation by an action that will put others in that very same situation. The name Florian is considered synonymous with fireman in the German speaking world. In some cases call for a fireman will actually be spoken as calls for Florian.

856 – Damghan earthquake kills an estimated 200,000 people, the sixth deadliest earthquake in recorded history

1808 – Ludwig van Beethoven conducts & performs in concert at the Theater an der Wien, Vienna, with the premiere of his Fifth Symphony, Sixth Symphony, Fourth Piano Concerto (performed by Beethoven himself) & Choral Fantasy (with Beethoven at the piano)

Jim Zinanti

~Follow the Star~

Epiphany Friday 6 January 2023

Potluck: 5:30 pm – Program: 7 pm-8:30 pm

To cap the Holy Nights, we gather to co-create an Epiphany on the Birthday of Joan of Arc, calling in the aid of Christ-Sophia-Michael, for an art-full community envisioning of the New Year 2023

Eurythmy with Jan Rank

Singing with Velsum Voices

Leading Thoughts with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Doors Open at 5:45 pm – Please Bring Food & Drink to Share

$10 more or less Love Donation Encouraged

For more info contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Rudolf Steiner Branch of The Anthroposophical Society
4249 North Lincoln Avenue. Chicago, IL 60618 (
map)
https://www.rschicago.org/happenings/calendar 
www.rschicago.org/donate

Sun Stands Still

Welcome Friends on this Winter Solstice 2022 –

Entering into the Longest Night
Entering into the Birth of Light
Consecrating the prophetic Nativity
Of a new Solar year
In Yule-Tide Exultation
In the light of Transformation…

The battle between old & new – Dark & Light…

The Winter Solstice is the dark before the dawn, a time of renewal, giving us the most primordial myths of humankind: In Old Norse mythology, the Sun goddess was swallowed up by the wolf of darkness, but was reborn as her daughter, the maiden goddess of the underworld, who rose again to illumine the world.

In Greece & Rome, midwinter marked the birth of Sun gods, such as Mithras & Dionysus, who died & journeyed into the underworld, winning gifts for humankind before their miraculous rebirth.

Dahlia Khodur

In the Hellenistic world, initiates into the Mysteries of Isis had to undergo a ceremony of death & rebirth in which they entered the underworld to gaze upon the “Sun at Midnight.” This ceremony, which had its origins in ancient Egypt, speaks of the journey of the soul into the fecund depths of the subconscious mind, where we meet the Guardian at the Threshold, which opens to the dark sea of spirit from which all creation comes forth, purified & born anew.

To this day people gather at sacred sites as far apart as Newgrange in Ireland & the temple of Karnak in Egypt, to celebrate the miracle of the Sun’s return at the darkest time of the year – In the pitch-black sanctuaries of caves & earth chambers, to wait for the birth of new light & life.

All ways we must honor the dark before calling in the light.

The esoteric meaning of this time of year can be gleaned from the ancient mystery schools & its essence applied consciously now.

Let each of us journey down into the cave of the soul to drink from the secret well of wisdom & find the hidden flame within the dark – then return bearing our own unique gift of Light for the world.

The hag has gone to seed – & become bone…a fresh soul-frame for the new year. Let us stand in uprightness at the door & dare to open the portal to face the abyss – To release ourselves from the outer world for a sacred moment, that we may invoke our own immaculate conception – That we may surrender to the ‘waking dreaming’ – To celebrate the dark, where the inner life is honored & nurtured by the many Marys within…

The power of Peace – The Birth of Love – The Light of Wisdom

… ‘The wine dark sea’…
… The active dark womb…
… The dark space between the stars…

Let the Power of Faith lead us from the darkness into the birth of our own unique inner light…

The Darkness is coming…
But never fear…
The darkness is coming…
But the light is near…
The darkness is coming…
The darkness is here…

Engel Kunst


The gift of the light (Gesture: Both hands scoop up light & bring it to your heart)
We thankfully take, But nothing may be, Just alone for our sake.
The more we give light (Hands move outward) The one to the other
It shines & spreads life (Arms move out horizontally, spreading light)
Growing still further,
Till every spark is set aflame. (Right hand in front of chest shows the proof of a flame.)
Till every heart, Joy shall proclaim. (Eurythmy Ah — arms up, palms upward)

~hag

21 December 2022 “Speaking with the Stars”: The winter solstice occurs at 3:48 pm CST today.

Mercury reaches greatest elongation east of the Sun (20°) at 9 am CST this morning. The solar system’s smallest planet is visible in the evening twilight.

Nearby, blazingly bright Venus is to Mercury’s west (lower right). Although Venus is closer to the horizon, it’s so bright that it will remain easy to spot until it sets about an hour after the Sun. In just a few days, a delicate crescent Moon will join this pair in the Christmas Eve sky.

Finally, Mars passes north of the bright red giant Aldebaran in Taurus at 10 pm CST tonight.

Sunrise: 7:19 A.M.
Sunset: 4:38 P.M.
Moonrise: 5:22 A.M.
Moonset: 2:55 P.M.
Moon Phase: Waning crescent (4%)

Resurrection of the Temple (The first Goetheanum) by Rita de Cassia Perez, Adriana’s mother

TONIGHT: The ‘Envy of the Gods’ – The ‘Envy of Human Beings’ Presented by Adriana Koulias*

A Winter Solstice offering preparing us for the Centennial commemoration of the burning of the first Goetheanum.

21 December 2022, at 5 pm PT, 6 pm MT, 7 pm CT, 8 pm ET

Here is a link to the World Clock for your time zone

Online & in-person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago

Dear Friends – This special presentation is supported by your generous donations. $10-$50 or pay what you will www.rschicago.org/donate (credit card or PayPal)

Please type ‘Adriana’ to designate your payment

For those attending in-person doors open at 5:30 pm for our Potluck meal.

Please bring food & drink to share.

For more Info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618(map) https://www.rschicago.org/happenings/calendar www.rschicago.org/donate

You are invited to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: Adriana Koulias

Time: Dec 21, 2022, 07:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89586637726

Meeting ID: 895 8663 7726

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Find your local number: https://us06web.zoom.us/u/kbtvb8sTRI

 Work on building the First Goetheanum, which was designed and supervised by Rudolf Steiner, began after the laying of the double dodecahedron foundation stone on the 20th of September 1913. Construction proceeded for a decade under enormous difficulties in the political, economic and cultural realms, brought on by the advent of the First World War. After the war when the building was near completion, the First Goetheanum was destroyed by an arsonist on New Year’s Eve 1922/1923.

This NYE 2022-23 will be the 100th anniversary of this event and the world is again facing many difficulties, political, economic and social.  Adriana’s lecture will explore what Rudolf Steiner meant by the ‘Envy of the Gods and the Envy of Human beings’ and how a consciousness of this during the coming 12 Holy Nights can provide the necessary strengthening for the coming twelve months.

During this presentation Adriana will speak about the three gifts given by Rudolf Steiner in 1913: The naming of Anthroposophy, The Fifth Gospel, and The Laying of the Foundation Stone of the First Goetheanum. She will explore with us how we can link our hearts to the old Goetheanum during the coming 12 Holy Nights to prepare ourselves for the coming 12 months in 2023, so we can work towards a Cosmic New Year.

In this way we will celebrate the Jubilee of the Christmas Conference and the resurrection of the living impulse of the First Goetheanum in the most auspicious way.

For Rudolf Steiner tells us: ‘My dear friends, may this link our hearts to the old Goetheanum which we had to consign to the elements. May it link our hearts also to the Spirit, to the Soul of this Goetheanum. With this vow before whatever is best within our being we want to live on not only into the new year. In strength of deed, bearing the spirit, leading the soul we want to live on into the new cosmic year.’ ~Rudolf Steiner, ‘The Envy of the Gods and the Envy of Human Beings.’

Adriana Koulias was born in 1960 in Brazil. Adriana moved to Australia when she was 9 years old where she lives today. She has studied art, operatic singing and nursing.  She has been studying Anthroposophy (awareness of our humanity) as given by Rudolf Steiner for 33 years and has since 2002-3 integrated this knowledge into several novels and a number of books, international lectures and articles online and in magazines.

Re-Patterning

Dear friends –
When all seems dead & barren on the face of the Earth, below the surface, the inner life is strengthened…& if we can let go of the false hustle & bustle imposed on us from without, & sit in the stillness of the darkness, where the heart-beat can be heard, There we will find the inner strength to let go of our fear of the dark. To let our eyes adjust to the dark. And soon we will see quite clearly in the dark. And then we can begin the work of Re-Patterning & opening to the inspiration of our Immaculate Conception – our pure thought, which creates the new paradigm…

Energizing Hope for the Sun’s return & the Earth’s renewal we make a ‘spiritual manger’ – a sacred space – in the cold black frozen places, that seem devoid of life, but are really just a sterilized palate – a clean slate, fresh & ready for the newly conceived light to be born into & fill…

At Advent, All our souls are pregnant with the possibility of giving birth to the light within. Wisdom fills us with this possibility that we may birth the Being of Love. This pure light is a becoming, it becomes, a rainbow, in us: shining with the colors of hope, truth & goodness; radiant with the hues of integrity, beauty & virtue, which overflow as joyous praise. In growing this rainbow within, we become, enlightened, with Good Will, bringing the power of Peace to bear in the world.
~hag

A contemplation for our 10:10 Thought-Seed:

Powerful beings who inhabit the spiritual worlds look with satisfaction and approval upon our thoughts about their world. They can help us only if we think about them; and although we may not have attained to clairvoyant vision into the spiritual world, if we know about these spiritual beings they can help us. In return for our study of spiritual science help comes to us from the spiritual world. It is not merely the things we learn, the knowledge we acquire, it is the beings of the higher Hierarchies themselves who help us when we know about them[…] The spiritual world helps us. We have need of it, we must know about it, and unite ourselves with it through conscious understanding“. ~ Rudolf Steiner – GA 168 – How Can the Destitution of Soul in Modern Times Be Overcome? – Zurich, October 10th, 1916

Chart via John Jardine Goss/ EarthSky.

17 December 2022 – “Speaking with the Stars”: You can see all 5 bright planets in the early evening sky in December 2022. You’ll need to start looking soon after sunset, because Venus and Mercury are close to the sunset glare. Saturn, Jupiter and Mars will be easy to spot, with Jupiter and Mars brighter than the brightest stars. As the month progresses, Venus will take its rightful place as the brightest of them all. And along with Mercury will be farther from the sunset, and easier to see. Beginning around December 24 – Christmas Eve and Christmas Day – you can watch as the waxing crescent moon begins moving up past the line of planets.

Hibiki Miyazaki

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day 

 ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Feast day of Lazarus – The biblical narrative of the raising of Lazarus is found in chapter 11 of the Gospel of John. Lazarus is introduced as a follower of Jesus, who lives in the town of Bethany near Jerusalem, the brother of Mary & Martha. The sisters send word to Jesus that Lazarus, “he whom thou lovest,” is ill. Instead of immediately traveling to Bethany, Jesus intentionally remains where he is for two more days before beginning the journey.

When Jesus arrives in Bethany, he finds that Lazarus is dead & has already been in his tomb for four days. He meets first with Martha & then Mary in turn. Martha laments that Jesus did not arrive soon enough to heal her brother & Jesus replies with the well-known statement, “I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die”. Later comes the famous simple phrase, “Jesus wept”.

In the presence of a crowd of mourners, Jesus comes to the tomb. Over the objections of Martha, Jesus has them roll the stone away from the entrance to the tomb & says a prayer. He then calls Lazarus to come out (“Come forth”) & Lazarus does so, still wrapped in his grave-cloths. Jesus then calls for someone to remove the grave-cloths, & let him go.

The narrative ends with the statement that many of the witnesses to this event “believed in him.” Others are said to report the events to the religious authorities in Jerusalem.

The Gospel of John mentions Lazarus again in chapter 12. Six days before the Passover on which Jesus is crucified, Jesus returns to Bethany & Lazarus attends a supper that Martha, his sister, serves. Jesus & Lazarus together attract the attention of many & the chief priests consider having Lazarus put to death because so many people are believing in Jesus on account of this miracle.

The miracle of the raising of Lazarus, the longest coherent narrative in John aside from the Passion, is the culmination of John’s “signs”. It explains the crowds seeking Jesus on Palm Sunday, & leads directly to the decision of Caiaphas & the Sanhedrin to kill Jesus.

It is notable that at John 11:11, after being told by His disciples to fear those who would kill Him, & after the parable about living in darkness, Jesus references his own parable & states that Lazarus sleeps, & that He will go “wake him up”. The disciples thought Jesus meant Lazarus was actually sleeping in verse 12. Then, in verse 14, Jesus speaks plainly & tells them that “Lazarus has died”. This is to be clear that Lazarus has died in the flesh, & is not sleeping but going thru the 1st Christian initiation.

Lazarus is spoken of by Rudolf Steiner as becoming John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, & formerly as Hiram Abiff the Master Builder of Solomon’s Temple & Christian Rosenkreutz.

Antoine Callet

497 BC – The first Saturnalia festival was celebrated in ancient Rome.

1790 – The Aztec calendar stone is discovered at El Zócalo, Mexico City.

1819 – Simón Bolívar declares the independence of Gran Colombia in Venezuela. Gran Colombia was the most prestigious country in Spanish America. John Quincy Adams, then Secretary of State & future president of the United States, claimed it to be one of the most powerful nations on the planet. This prestige, attracted to the nation unionist ideas of independence movements in Cuba, the Dominican Republic & Puerto Rico, which sought to form an associated state with the republic.

1833 – Deathday of Kaspar Hauser, the rightful Prince of Baden, died after a murder attempt on 12.12.1833

1873 – Birthday of Eleanor Charlotte Merry, an English poet, artist, musician & anthroposophist with a strong Celtic impulse & interest in esoteric wisdom. She studied in Vienna & met Rudolf Steiner in 1922 after becoming interested in his teachings. She went on to organize Summer Schools where Steiner gave lectures, & was secretary for the World Conference on Spiritual Science in London in 1928

Eleanor Charlotte Kynaston grew up in a liberal educational environment, her father being the well known classical scholar & professor of Ancient Greek, Herbert Snow aka KynastonIt was only at the age of 13 that she began to attend a regular school. This was also when she began to take a passionate interest in music. Two years later, her father became Deacon of Durham, so Eleanor grew up close to the beautiful cathedral. She was able to read the manuscripts that were kept in the monastic library, walking up & down amongst the Norman columns of the cathedral & experienced something of a real, concrete history, something completely different from what she read in her schoolbooks. It was the myths & legends that captivated her, & she learned by heart Tennyson’s King Arthur.

The stream of scholars & theologians that entered their house fed her spiritual longings.

As she grew up, she sought a career as singer, wanting to study music & art. At 19, she left home for a course of study in Vienna, which led not only to a fine command of the German language & development of her musical skills but also placed her in a kind of artistic-aesthetic inner crisis. Soon after her return to England, she married the well-known Oxford surgeon Merry, to whose professional commitments Eleanor Merry was to devote much of her energy besides the rearing of their son & daughter.

She learnt about Theosophy at the beginning of World War I when a copy of the “Secret Doctrine” of H.P. Blavatsky was sent her by persons unknown. As she read it, she felt as if guided by some unseen hand, & studied further works of Annie Besant & other Theosophists. After the war, she was made aware of Rudolf Steiner’s Knowledge of the Higher Worlds. In January 1922 she met Daniel Nicol Dunlop in London for the first time. He was reading a lecture of Rudolf Steiner’s to the anthroposophical group there. A few months later, her husband died of pneumonia, after which she had her first personal conversation with DN Dunlop. Dunlop was still fired up with gratitude over his meeting with Rudolf Steiner some few weeks previously.

She took part in the conference “Spiritual Values in Education” in Oxford that August, where she met Rudolf Steiner personally for the first time. She saw him first in a corridor & by his gait & the manner in which he looked at her, she had the impression: “He knows where he is going.”

She assisted D.N. Dunlop in the preparation of the subsequent Summer School in Penmaenmawr the following year, where a further conversation with Rudolf Steiner took place in which he recommended to her the new techniques in painting that had been developed under his guidance. She was soon exhibiting publicly in London& elsewhere. He also advised her to form as strong a bond as possible with Dunlop. This summer school, devoted to the theme “The Evolution of Consciousness” was felt by Steiner to be a milestone in the development of the anthroposophical movement.

Eleanor was present at the founding of the new General Anthroposophical Society at the Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland around New Year 1923/24.

The theme of the ensuing Summer School at Torquay in 1924, “True and False Paths in Spiritual Investigation” (GA 243), stemmed from a conversation she had with Rudolf Steiner on this occasion.

In her further work in Britain after Rudolf Steiner’s death, she wholeheartedly supported D.N. Dunlop’s efforts to create an open, inclusive & at the same time spiritually founded continuation of the anthroposophical work. She acted as secretary of the anthroposophical World Conference in London of 1928 &wrote a play around the figure of King Arthur for the youth conference initiated by David Clement in Glastonbury in 1932. More immediately than anyone, she experienced the dramatic events affecting Daniel Dunlop between 1929, when he became General Secretary of the Anthroposophical Society in Great Britain & the spring of 1935, when he was expelled from the General Anthroposophical Society & died a short while later. After his death, she maintained intimate friendships with her half-sister, Marna Pease, Walter Johannes Stein & particularly Eugen Kolisko, whom she helped to build up the School for Spiritual Science, wrote numerous articles for their magazine “The Modern Mystic“, & wrote down the biographical notes Kolisko dictated to her. In the 1940s she led a painting school together with Maria Schindler as well as working with her on the book Pure Colour (1946), leading to large public exhibitions.

Jane Hudson

POD (Poem Of the Day)

~i’ve known that tempting feast of death when
while darkness filled the mind, the heart cried out –
let us listen & hear…
i know when the eye of truth
is plucked from the head,
only the blood of rage remains –
Can we make the change
to heal the Comforter?
Come & Call forth with me
a bright secret veiled in black cloth –
a heart-light beyond heaven which is the light within
re-kindled through sacrifice…

~hag

The 4th Sunday of Advent – 18 December 2022 
at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago, 2 pm – 3:30 pm CST 
(after Rev. Jonah Evans talk at the Christian Community)

The Individuality of Conscience and the Goetheanum 
with Lucien Dante Lazar

Out of our conscience, we witness the Christ in the other. And through this Seeing, our I is born within us, whose self-conscious interior is the I of God. This is a mystery of John the Baptist.



When Love enters the human heart as an awakening to freedom, the Wisdom of form enters our awareness, and color, that majesty of Light, teaches us about creation. This is a mystery of the painter Raphael.

When the Word approaches us, inspiring us in our language to find the Heavenly Sophia as intellect, we write truth and honor the New Revelation of the Christ and His marriage to Sophia. And out of this marriage, we learn about ourselves. This is a mystery of Novalis.

On this last Sunday of Advent dedicated to the Human Being & the Angels, we will engage in these three Christian gifts through the social encounter, our working with color, and our thinking through language. And we will strive to harmonize these three incarnations of this significant individuality with the birth, death, and resurrection of the Goetheanum.

$10-$50 or pay what you will at the door or online www.rschicago.org/donate(credit card or PayPal)

For more Info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator 
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg
Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (map) 
https://www.rschicago.org/happenings/calendar 
www.rschicago.org/donate

Resurrection of the Temple (The first Goetheanum) by Rita de Cassia Perez, Adriana’s mother

The ‘Envy of the Gods’ – The ‘Envy of Human Beings’

Presented by Adriana Koulias*

A Winter Solstice offering preparing us for the Centennial commemoration

of the burning of the first Goetheanum.

21 December 2022, at 5 pm PT, 6 pm MT, 7 pm CT, 8 pm ET

Here is a link to the World Clock for your time zone

Online & in-person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago

Dear Friends – This special presentation is supported by your generous donations. $10-$50 or pay what you will www.rschicago.org/donate (credit card or PayPal)

Please type ‘Adriana’ to designate your payment

For those attending in-person doors open at 5:30 pm for our Potluck meal.

Please bring food & drink to share.

For more Info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618(map) https://www.rschicago.org/happenings/calendar www.rschicago.org/donate

You are invited to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: Adriana Koulias

Time: Dec 21, 2022, 07:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89586637726

Meeting ID: 895 8663 7726

One tap mobile

+13092053325,,89586637726# US

+13126266799,,89586637726# US (Chicago)

Find your local number: https://us06web.zoom.us/u/kbtvb8sTRI

 Work on building the First Goetheanum, which was designed and supervised by Rudolf Steiner, began after the laying of the double dodecahedron foundation stone on the 20th of September 1913. Construction proceeded for a decade under enormous difficulties in the political, economic and cultural realms, brought on by the advent of the First World War. After the war when the building was near completion, the First Goetheanum was destroyed by an arsonist on New Year’s Eve 1922/1923.

This NYE 2022-23 will be the 100th anniversary of this event and the world is again facing many difficulties, political, economic and social.  Adriana’s lecture will explore what Rudolf Steiner meant by the ‘Envy of the Gods and the Envy of Human beings’ and how a consciousness of this during the coming 12 Holy Nights can provide the necessary strengthening for the coming twelve months.

During this presentation Adriana will speak about the three gifts given by Rudolf Steiner in 1913: The naming of Anthroposophy, The Fifth Gospel, and The Laying of the Foundation Stone of the First Goetheanum. She will explore with us how we can link our hearts to the old Goetheanum during the coming 12 Holy Nights to prepare ourselves for the coming 12 months in 2023, so we can work towards a Cosmic New Year.

In this way we will celebrate the Jubilee of the Christmas Conference and the resurrection of the living impulse of the First Goetheanum in the most auspicious way.

For Rudolf Steiner tells us: ‘My dear friends, may this link our hearts to the old Goetheanum which we had to consign to the elements. May it link our hearts also to the Spirit, to the Soul of this Goetheanum. With this vow before whatever is best within our being we want to live on not only into the new year. In strength of deed, bearing the spirit, leading the soul we want to live on into the new cosmic year.’ ~Rudolf Steiner, ‘The Envy of the Gods and the Envy of Human Beings.’

Adriana Koulias was born in 1960 in Brazil. Adriana moved to Australia when she was 9 years old where she lives today. She has studied art, operatic singing and nursing.  She has been studying Anthroposophy (awareness of our humanity) as given by Rudolf Steiner for 33 years and has since 2002-3 integrated this knowledge into several novels and a number of books, international lectures and articles online and in magazines.

the Good Witch

Tessa Lingren

Folks often ask why I call myself ~hag. No, I was not born hag; I chose those initials because I want to reclaim the archetype of the Wise Crone. In our modern culture, the Crone is either invisible or scorned. If a woman is wise & powerful she is often feared or demonized. It’s true that we can often be direct, & outspoken, which in a woman is not prized.

The Crone is featured in many myths & fairytales. She is the witch – the haggard old woman who lives in the forest; a friend of death, feared by the uninitiated. From Hansel & Gretel to Baba Yaga, this archetype has become one to avoid. In folklore the Crone may also exhibit supernatural, magical abilities, either for helpful or obstructive purposes.

The ancient archetype of the Crone held a more holistic ideal & can be traced back to the Middle East, Balkans, Scandinavia & Ancient Greece.  For example, in Norse mythology the God Thor wrestled the crone Elli.

The word ‘crone’ only entered the English language around 1390. It was derived from the Anglo-French word ‘carogne’ (an insult), which itself was derived from the Old North French ‘charogne’ or ‘caroigne’, meaning a disagreeable woman (or literally “carrion”).

However, when we reclaim this archetype, The Crone is said to derive from another more positive origin, with the Word Crone coming from Crown, indicating wisdom emanating from the head. She plays the role of Hierophant or initiator, demanding seemingly impossible tasks, which are often only completed with the help of supernatural elemental beings.

Paula Belle Flores.

The crone aspect of the Female Metaphor is not just about age, it the mysterious time of the waning crescent, & dark Moon phases. It is about the acceptance & valuing of the darkness, as an essential life process. Once this aspect was connected to regeneration & acumen – Ancient cultures understood the dark as the source of being.

In a culture where the darkness is thought of as evil – where there is no place for the compost, this aspect is avoided or loathed. Where only the Light is valued as positive, where the nurturance of the Dark has been forgotten, real wisdom & compassion will never be realized.

If we are stuck in the duality of light vs. dark, good vs. evil, blue vs. red – or any other either/or frame of mind, we will never escape the prison walls of division – we will never escape the jailer – the executioner who divides one I from another.

Freedom is to be able to live in the frame of mind that is guided by an all-inclusive attitude, always able to consider & even accept contradiction, whose outlook on life & interaction with the world is not cause for division but guided by the searching for a higher unity.

The world has been run for too long by the analytical man-mind-set of either/or. A new womb-mind-set of ‘As Well As’ brings the opening to choice, & promotes both, with the heart in the center, weighing & balancing the 2 with the transcendent third.

And so let us write a new story, where we embrace the gifts of darkness, the hard truth of death in life, which makes true regeneration possible.

~hag  

***Listen to the podcast on this theme HERE

10 December 2022 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Cassiopeia the Queen is circumpolar – She circles around the north celestial pole, never dipping below the horizon. However, the best time to see Cassiopeia is during fall and winter evenings, since that’s when the constellation rides highest in the sky. The bright stars of Cassiopeia trace out an M or W, depending on its position in the sky and your perspective.

Scabolocs Bodo

 Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day 

 ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Benjamin Jean Joseph Constant

According to the original Calendar of the Soul by Rudolf Steiner, Today is the Birthday of Judith. The book from the Apocrypha, named after her, tells the lesser known story of this beautiful widow who plied enemy Assyrian General Holofernes with cheese & wine until he fell into a drunken stupor. Judith then beheaded the general in his sleep, & his soldiers fled in fear, saving her people from the Assyrians. This story is the subject of much renowned artwork. And is told at Hanukkah.

1198 – Deathday of Averroes, Arabian philosopher, astronomer, most famous for his commentaries on Aristotle’s works, which had been largely forgotten in the West. It was through the Latin translations of Averroes’ work, beginning in the twelfth century, that the legacy of Aristotle was recovered in the West. Averroes attempted to reconcile Aristotelian philosophy with Islamic theology & to demonstrate that philosophy & theology were two paths to understanding the same truth. Rudolf Steiner refers to him a lot in his lectures on Karmic relationships.

1520 – The Burning the Papal Bull of Excommunication by Martin Luther. Because of constant attacks from the Roman Church, Luther was forced to shape his ideology into an autonomous theology. During the years 1520-1521 he worked on the three great works “Address to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation”, “The Babylonian Captivity” & “The Freedom of the Christian Man”, thereby emotionally cutting himself off from Rome.

The inquisition against Luther was taken up again in 1520, partly because of these works. The peak of the inquisition came, with the Papal Bull of excommunication in which Luther was ordered to recant his teachings.

Luther reacted in protest. He burned the Papal Bull (“Exurge Domine”) along with the book of church law & many other books by his enemies on December 10, 1520 in Wittenberg where the Luther Oak (Luthereiche) stands today. He is said to have yelled: “Because you, godless book, have grieved or shamed the holiness of the Father, be saddened and consumed by the eternal flames of Hell”.

This behavior caused a conclusive and irrevocable break with Rome. On January 3, 1521 the Pope excommunicated Luther.

The Emperor, however, felt forced to accept Luther because of the pro-Luther mood in the empire & because of the influence of various princes who were hoping to weaken the Pope’s political influence through Luther. As a result, the rebel was guaranteed safe escort on his trip to the Imperial Diet of Worms.

1884 – Birthday of Albert Steffen, poet, painter, dramatist, essayist, & novelist. He joined the Theosophical Society in Germany in 1910, & the Anthroposophical Society in 1912. He was 1 of the original Vorstand members, & became its president after the death of founder, Rudolf Steiner. Steffen was chief editor of the society’s journal, Das Goetheanum, from 1921-1963. At an early age his senses were especially attuned to all of nature. “As a child it always seemed to me as though a human countenance peeped forth from every blossom. From the tulip, that of a Turkish maiden; from the chrysanthemum, that of a Japanese dancer; from the sunflower of Inca King; from the geranium a Moorish boy.”~AS

By age 14 he had intuitively ‘understood’ that the human soul goes through the process of reincarnation. At age 21 he moved to Berlin, & 2 years later, to Munich. There he became a freelance writer & published his first novel, ‘Ott, Alois and Werelsche’ in 1907.

In Berlin, Steffen 1st heard a lecture by Rudolf Steiner. He writes: “I recognized immediately the leader of humanity: the wisdom on his brow, the love pervading his eye, the conscience in his word.”

In 1914, the beginning of World War I, Steffen was 29. At that time he was making frequent visits to Dornach. Of his experience there, he wrote: “Harmony reigned through a single man’s God-founded spirit,”…“Carving the Goetheanum capitals and architraves furthered me as a shaper of words.” In 1920, at the age of 35 Steffen moved to Dornach. In 1921 he was asked by Rudolf Steiner to be editor of the newly founded ‘Das Goetheanum’ weekly periodical.

On New Year’s 1923 Steffen witnessed the destruction by fire of the 1st Goetheanum, despite all efforts to save it. At the Christmas Conference Rudolf Steiner named Steffen to head the Section for Belles Lettres in the newly constituted Anthroposophical Society & named him Deputy Chairman. Of Albert Steffen he said: “The members of Vorstand are, I believe, chosen in the right way. Albert Steffen has already been an anthroposophist before he was born; this must be recognized with regard to him” (The Christmas Conference).

In an article which appeared in Das Goetheanum February 22nd, 1923, Steiner wrote about Steffen: “Within the Anthroposophical Movement, the spirit of such a poet, if rightly felt, should be experienced as the bringer of a message from the spiritual sphere.”… “That he wishes to work in this Movement, should be felt as a good destiny.”

F W Zeylmans van Emmichoven, a Dutch Anthroposophist, wrote that Rudolf Steiner wanted the members of the Vorstand to recognize themselves & each other against the background of the spiritual streams to which they belonged, “to cultivate fraternal feeling even between strongly contrasting personalities.”

Rudolf Steiner died in 1925; Steffen was with him in his last days. He expressed his reverence & thankfulness for this great initiate’s being & gift to humanity, recreating a ‘memory picture’ for the reader – ‘In Memoriam, Rudolf Steiner’.

After Steiner’s death, in accordance with his wishes, Albert Steffen became Chairman of the Society, serving to keep a center point of balance amidst contrasting personalities & divergent streams, which he was not able to do.

“Let this be for us our cosmic goal: –
To paint a living picture for the soul
which the claws of death cannot despoil,
which lights the darkest dungeon deep below –
take a new earth with us when we go,
which no evil shadow e’er can soil,
no tide nor flood can ever wash away,
no wind that blows can ever bleach or blight,
will never yield to acid’s poisoned bite,
will never melt in fire’s burning ray,
that’s brighter than the sun’s own visage is –
but only Christ himself can give us this!”

~Albert Steffen, Adonis Spiel / Eine Herbstfeier

Albert Steffen is also concerned with how the forces of growth & becoming are victorious. He writes: “Everywhere Christ emerges from the elements. With the lifting power with which he rolled the stone from the grave, support your body, with the light forces with which he permeates the plants, renew your life! With the air of heaven with which he sends you thoughts, like butterflies, fill your words. Guide your ego from rock to forest to the clouds, right up to the sun, by shaping, condensing, transforming and purifying it. Gaze upon your destiny from above, with starry eyes.” Steffen’s work is grounded in a living experience of the eternal. It conveys a quality which helps transform our consciousness of the earth, helping to redeem & heal.

One of Steffen’s friends was the American poet-dramatist Percy MacKaye. They spoke a similar inner language & conversed together through poetry. In an essay, ‘The Excellence of Albert Steffen’, Percy MacKaye seeks to describe his friend. “How shall I sketch his portrait for the reader? The solemnity of Savonarola, illumined by the radiance of Shelly, the staunch piety of William Penn (in black quakerish hat), all twinkled over and merrified by the arch smile and skipping gait of the marble faun himself – on a holiday, the athleticism of an alpine skier, subdued to the tender solitude of St Francis feeding the birds.”

In Steffen’s dramas one can discover interweaving themes. One is that of the victory of the spirit reborn in Christ over physical death & the forces of destruction & chaos. This is an aspect of the struggle for transformation of evil into good, a teaching of Manes who lived in the third century after Christ. Strength is called forth to release worn-out thought forms in order to grasp a deeper clarity; this leads to acts of sacrifice, inspired through love. Their example has a transforming effect, both on the people within the play & in the audience.

‘Friend’ – (from the Anglo-Saxon root: freon – to love) is defined as ‘one disposed to promote the good of another’. – Steffen describes how he aspires to view others: “The developed person does not judge others and thus set them back, but lets them stand and understands them.”

1896 – Deathday of Alfred Nobel, a Swedish chemist, engineer, inventor, businessman, & philanthropist. Known for inventing dynamite, Nobel also owned Bofors, which he had redirected from its previous role as primarily an iron & steel producer to a major manufacturer of cannon & other armaments. Nobel held 355 different patents, dynamite being the most famous. After reading a premature obituary which condemned him for profiting from the sales of arms, he bequeathed his fortune to institute the Nobel Prizes.

Holiday Market at the Rudolf Steiner Branch 
4249 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago
TODAY! 10 December 2022 – from 11 am – 4 pm

Handcrafted gifts, décor & toys
Featuring Live Music, Puppetry & Candle Dipping!!!

If you would like to be a vendor contact Elizabeth Kelly 
eilisaineariadne@gmail.com

The 4th Sunday of Advent – 18 December 2022 at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago, 2 pm – 3:30 pm CST (after Rev. Jonah Evans talk at the Christian Community)

The Individuality of Conscience and the Goetheanum with Lucien Dante Lazar

Out of our conscience, we witness the Christ in the other. And through this Seeing, our I is born within us, whose self-conscious interior is the I of God. This is a mystery of John the Baptist.

When Love enters the human heart as an awakening to freedom, the Wisdom of form enters our awareness, and color, that majesty of Light, teaches us about creation. This is a mystery of the painter Raphael.

When the Word approaches us, inspiring us in our language to find the Heavenly Sophia as intellect, we write truth and honor the New Revelation of the Christ and His marriage to Sophia. And out of this marriage, we learn about ourselves. This is a mystery of Novalis.

On this last Sunday of Advent dedicated to the Human Being & the Angels, we will engage in these three Christian gifts through the social encounter, our working with color, and our thinking through language. And we will strive to harmonize these three incarnations of this significant individuality with the birth, death, and resurrection of the Goetheanum.

$10-$50 or pay what you will at the door or online www.rschicago.org/donate (credit card or PayPal)

For more Info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hazel Archer-Ginsberg – Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (map) https://www.rschicago.org/happenings/calendar www.rschicago.org/donate

Resurrection of the Temple (The first Goetheanum) by Rita de Cassia Perez, Adriana’s mother

The ‘Envy of the Gods’ – The ‘Envy of Human Beings’

Presented by Adriana Koulias*

A Winter Solstice offering preparing us for the Centennial commemoration of the burning of the first Goetheanum.

21 December 2022, at 5 pm PT, 6 pm MT, 7 pm CT, 8 pm ET Here is a link to the World Clock for your time zone

Online & in-person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago

Dear Friends – This special presentation is supported by your generous donations. $10-$50 or pay what you will www.rschicago.org/donate (credit card or PayPal)

Please type ‘Adriana’ to designate your payment

For those attending in-person doors open at 5:30 pm for our Potluck meal. Please bring food & drink to share.

For more Info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hazel Archer-Ginsberg – Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (map) https://www.rschicago.org/happenings/calendar www.rschicago.org/donate

You are invited to a scheduled Zoom meeting. Topic: Adriana Koulias

Time: Dec 21, 2022, 07:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89586637726

Meeting ID: 895 8663 7726

One tap mobile +13092053325,,89586637726# US +13126266799,,89586637726# US (Chicago) Find your local number: https://us06web.zoom.us/u/kbtvb8sTRI

 Work on building the First Goetheanum, which was designed and supervised by Rudolf Steiner, began after the laying of the double dodecahedron foundation stone on the 20th of September 1913. Construction proceeded for a decade under enormous difficulties in the political, economic and cultural realms, brought on by the advent of the First World War. After the war when the building was near completion, the First Goetheanum was destroyed by an arsonist on New Year’s Eve 1922/1923.

This NYE 2022-23 will be the 100th anniversary of this event and the world is again facing many difficulties, political, economic and social.  Adriana’s lecture will explore what Rudolf Steiner meant by the ‘Envy of the Gods and the Envy of Human beings’ and how a consciousness of this during the coming 12 Holy Nights can provide the necessary strengthening for the coming twelve months.

During this presentation Adriana will speak about the three gifts given by Rudolf Steiner in 1913: The naming of Anthroposophy, The Fifth Gospel, and The Laying of the Foundation Stone of the First Goetheanum. She will explore with us how we can link our hearts to the old Goetheanum during the coming 12 Holy Nights to prepare ourselves for the coming 12 months in 2023, so we can work towards a Cosmic New Year.

In this way we will celebrate the Jubilee of the Christmas Conference and the resurrection of the living impulse of the First Goetheanum in the most auspicious way.

For Rudolf Steiner tells us: ‘My dear friends, may this link our hearts to the old Goetheanum which we had to consign to the elements. May it link our hearts also to the Spirit, to the Soul of this Goetheanum. With this vow before whatever is best within our being we want to live on not only into the new year. In strength of deed, bearing the spirit, leading the soul we want to live on into the new cosmic year.’ ~Rudolf Steiner, ‘The Envy of the Gods and the Envy of Human Beings.’

Adriana Koulias was born in 1960 in Brazil. Adriana moved to Australia when she was 9 years old where she lives today. She has studied art, operatic singing and nursing.  She has been studying Anthroposophy (awareness of our humanity) as given by Rudolf Steiner for 33 years and has since 2002-3 integrated this knowledge into several novels and a number of books, international lectures and articles online and in magazines.