We are deep in the midst of Easter-Tide during this evocative year of the ‘Paradox’. And so our spiritual scientific research experiment continues.
Our 1stesoteric Ascension came right after May Day.
I had the honor of presenting ‘Climbing Jacobs Ladder’, an Ascension festival of the Hierarchies & of the Elements, in Ann Arbor; standing where Dr. Ernst Katz often spoke, in the Rudolf Steiner House – headquarters for the Anthroposophical Society of America.
Every year, when the earth begins to breathe out in the springtime, the mystery of the Ascension of Christ, Who is the Spirit of the Earth, is renewed.
Ayse Domeniconi
Along with the rescuing of our etheric body, the fulfillment of the secret promise of the Ascension is the 2nd coming!
And at the moment of the Ascension the true meaning of death as a birth into the spiritual world, was made manifest. For when the Risen Christ returned ‘to sit at the right hand of the Father’, He became the bridge, revealing the secret that the human soul can reach the highest sphere of the Father Ground of the World, where Christ derived the forces for His Resurrection Body – & where our future stage of Spirit Man, is derived.
Ascension also provides the opportunity for The Holy Spirit, who illuminates the individual ego-consciousness, to be able to appear in earthly evolution at Whitsun; flashing in thru this opened gate, to pour into earth existence the truth of the Mystery of Golgotha & the Ascension in full wisdom.
But in order for this to happen Christ had to Ascend. Steiner tells us, ’Then after 10 days He sent the Holy Spirit- that divine Being of the Trinity that does not overpower, but enhances the individual ego of human beings.’
So now the Christ impulse can enter human souls thru the mediation of the Holy Spirit, enabling us to retain our “I” in freedom.
Sri Aurobindo
How lyrically profound that our esoteric Whitsun comes today on Mother’s Day! A true acknowledgement of the Divine Sophia, & an advancement away from family ties into a conscious community freely connected thru the Holy Spirit, to Christ.
Laura Summer
In the East, Whitsun or Pentecost is called Trinity Sunday, since with the completion of the 3 parts of the moveable feasts of Easter-Tide, we have been brought into contact with the 3 persons of the godhead. We receive the Resurrection forces thru The Son; at Ascension we gain access to the sphere of The father; & at Pentecost we receive the Holy Spirit.
In truth, dear friends, we can recognize 3 Whitsun events in history.
Mandy Halls
The 1st experience, occurred on the evening after the Resurrection.
‘Jesus said to
them again, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” And when He had said
this, He breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone’s sins, their sins are
forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.’ ~ John 20:21
Forgiveness is the 1st step in building a
conscious community.
This 1st Whitsun was recorded only by John. Thru the 1st Christian initiation, Lazarus, who became John, ‘the disciple whom Jesus loved’, was, along with Mary the Mother of Jesus, & the earthly bearer of the Divine Sophia forces, were the only conscious witnesses to the Mystery of Golgotha. The rest of the apostles would stay in a dream state until Pentecost 50 days later.
The 2nd event is described in the Acts of the Apostles 2:1-4 –
‘When the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all together with one accord in the upper room. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, like a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the whole house where they were gathered. Then there appeared to them tongues of fire, like flames which divided until they came to rest on each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with foreign tongues, each uttering what the spirit gave them to say’.
Manny Krest
The Holy Spirit descends 1st to their heads,
& then penetrates into their hearts, so that the larynx could be opened to
speak the language of the heart, uniting them in a new community.
Rudolf Steiner tells us in his ‘Philosophy of Spiritual Activity’: ‘Only because human individuals are one spirit can they also enjoy life side by side. The free person lives in confidence that the other free person belongs with them to a spiritual world and in their intentions will meet with them’.
In 1907 Steiner created a Whitsun congress in Munich as a new Rosicrucian impulse, displaying the 7 seals of St. John’s Apocalypse, a representation of the 7 stages of Christian initiation.
This Whitsun spirit came alive again for the 3rd time in history at the founding of the Christmas Conference, with the laying of the Foundation Stone of Love into the hearts of those connected with the Anthroposophical movement.
Iona Miller
Just like the Grail Mystery of old, the experience of the Holy Spirit in the image of a dove appears above the chalice. And now thru the process of etherizing our blood, it rises as an etheric stream from the heart to the head, a reversal of the Whitsun experience.
One of our most important tasks is to consciously unite these 2 opposite streams. The Foundation Stone with its mantric expression is the key, in which the individual & social principles are united harmoniously.
Denise Yocco
Lifting out of the ‘me’ into the ‘we’, so that the spirit flame can enter & spread out thru us, to become what Steiner called a “World Whitsun”, which began in earnest at the Christmas Conference, where the reversed Whitsun, was born, the idea of taking the spirit that has flowed thru the head into the heart, transforming it into the wisdom of love to redeem our intelligence, & then give it back out as a gift to humanity.
Our work is to take our individual Inner Whitsun & expand it, into what Steiner calls the “World Festival of Knowledge” a path leading from ‘Spirit Recalling’, to ‘Spirit Mindfulness’, to ‘Spirit Beholding.’
9 May 2019 – “Speaking with the Stars”: The thick crescent Moon shines in the west after dusk, with Castor & Pollux to Her upper right & Procyon farther left.
Summer is more than five
weeks away, but the Summer Triangle
is making its appearance in the east, one star after another. The first in view
is Vega, already low in the
northeast as twilight fades. Next up is Deneb,
lower left of Vega by two or three fists at arm’s length. It comes above the
horizon around when twilight fades into full night. The third is Altair, which shows up far to their
lower right around midnight.
According to Rudolf Steiner’s Original Calendar of the Soul today is: The Birthday of Hermes & Job
ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
1760 – Death-day
of Count Zinzendorf , A social
reformer & bishop of the Moravian
Church. The Zinzendorf family belonged to one of the most ancient of noble
families in Lower Austria. Among his ancestors was the Emperor Maximillian I.
Zinzendorf did
not intend to found a religious organization distinct from the area’s Lutheran
Church, but to create a Christian association, by demonstrating practical
benevolence, that might awaken dull Lutheranism. He began to think that true
Christianity could be best promoted by free associations of Christians, which
in the course of time might grow into churches with no state connection.
In 1722,
Zinzendorf offered asylum to a number of refugees from Moravia & Bohemia
& built the village of Herrnhut on
a corner of his estate.
Out of study
& prayer, the community formed a document known as the Brüderlicher Vertrag,
the ‘Brotherly Agreement’, today known as “The Moravian Covenant for
Christian Living.” The Moravian Church is one of the few denominations
that emphasizes a code of Christian behavior over specific creeds.
In these
communities, a radical equality of spiritual life was practiced. Nobility &
Native Americans shared common quarters; slaves were full members of the Church
& could be elected to offices of leadership.
Zinzendorf was consecrated bishop in Berlin on 20 May 1737. Zinzendorf’s
interest in missionary work was sparked by meeting two Inuit children.
In 1736,
accusations from neighboring nobles & questions of theological orthodoxy
caused Zinzendorf to be exiled from his home in Saxony. He & a number of
his followers moved to Marienborn (near Büdingen) & began a period of exile
& travel, during which he became known as the “Pilgrim Count.”
In 1741, Zinzendorf visited Pennsylvania, becoming one of the few 18th century European nobles to have actually set foot in the Americas. In addition to visiting leaders such as Benjamin Franklin, he met with the leaders of the Iroquois.
Zinzendorf’s theology strongly included the emotional life of the believer as well as the intellectual. He criticized the coldly intellectual approach common in his day, & built a great deal of practice around the transformation of the emotions. He referred to this as the “religion of the heart.”
1805 – Death-day
of Friedrich Schiller, some say he
was poisoned (GA 64) The coffin containing what was purportedly Schiller’s
skeleton, was brought in 1827, into the Weimarer Fürstengruft (Weimar’s Ducal
Vault), later also Goethe’s resting place. On 3 May 2008, scientists announced
that DNA tests showed that the skull of this skeleton is not Schiller’s, &
his tomb is now vacant.
Friedrich
Schiller was a German poet, philosopher, physician, historian, &
playwright. During the last seventeen years of his life (1788–1805), Schiller
struck up a productive, if complicated, friendship with the already famous &
influential Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. They frequently discussed issues
concerning human freedom. Schiller encouraged Goethe to finish works he left as
sketches. This relationship & these discussions led to a period now
referred to as Weimar Classicism. They also worked together on Xenien, a
collection of short satirical poems in which both Schiller & Goethe
challenge opponents to their philosophical vision.
Schiller wrote
many philosophical papers on ethics & aesthetics. He synthesized the
thought of Immanuel Kant with the thought of the German Idealist philosopher,
Karl Leonhard Reinhold. He elaborated Christoph Martin Wieland’s concept of die
schöne Seele (the beautiful soul), a human being whose emotions have been
educated by reason, so that Pflicht und Neigung (duty & inclination) are no
longer in conflict with one another. Beauty, for Schiller, is not merely an
aesthetic experience, but a moral one as well: the Good is the Beautiful.
His philosophical work was particularly concerned with the question of human freedom, a preoccupation which also guided his historical researches, & found its way as well into his dramas. Schiller wrote important essays on the question of the sublime, addressing one aspect of human freedom—the ability to defy one’s animal instincts, such as the drive for self-preservation, when, for example, someone willingly sacrifices themselves for conceptual ideals.
“…I should like to speak today about an individual who was
incarnated about the second century A.D. in Rome, as it then was, and who with
great sensitiveness of perception had witnessed the willing martyrdom suffered
by the Christians in their efforts to promulgate their cause in the Roman
Empire. This individual had also witnessed the terrible injustices and the many
forms of depravity and corruption which were so rife in the Roman Empire at
that time. Numberless manifestations of Good and Evil were witnessed and
experienced by this individual. With the methods of spiritual research which
enable such happenings to be recognised, we find this individual drawn into the
tumultuous happenings which at that time, during the second half of the second
century A.D., were experienced in the Roman Empire in connection with the
spread of Christianity. There is something extremely moving about this
individual when the eye of spirit is directed upon him in the way I explained
last time with reference to other individuals in their repeated earthly lives.
In this individual who lived to a very great age and who had
witnessed so much Good in deeds of supreme sacrifice in the sphere of
germinating Christianity, and so much that was evil and bad in Roman life at
that time, there arose a kind of realisation which was also a question: Where
is the balance, the mean? Is there only the wholly Good and the wholly Evil in
the world?
With the consciousness of Imagination and Inspiration one can
follow quite clearly how this individual was subsequently reborn in the
eleventh century, as a woman. The experiences undergone in the life as a woman
levelled out the hard, steel-like angularity of soul which had developed during
the Roman incarnation when he had reached a great age. This trait was softened
and mellowed and became a faculty of inner, thoughtful contemplation of Good
and Evil. This individual then came again to the Earth in the eighteenth
century and was born as the German poet, Friedrich Schiller.
And now study Schiller’s life and see how it develops, striving to
find a middle condition, a balance, a mean. Schiller needed Goethe before he
could get rid of all that had remained in him from the conviction that there is
only Good, there is only Evil. Read Schiller’s dramas, and you will understand
them if you think of his earlier incarnation.
What circumstances lie behind Schiller’s life and outlook? The experiences he had undergone in the Roman incarnation continued to be alive within him, but he had subsequently incarnated as a woman in the Middle Ages. And then, in his life between death and a new birth, it was in the Saturn sphere that the most significant development of his karma took place.” Rudolf Steiner, Karmic Relationships, Volume VI, Stuttgart, 1st June, 1924 https://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA240/English/RSP1971/19240601p01.html
1877 – A magnitude 8.8 earthquake off the coast of Peru kills 4,541, including some as far away as Hawaii & Japan
1904 – The steam locomotive City of Truro becomes the first steam engine in Europe to exceed 100 mph
1921 – Birthday of Sophie Scholl, German activist, working with the White Rose non-violent resistance group in Nazi Germany. She was convicted of high treason after having been found distributing anti-war leaflets at the University of Munich with her brother, Hans. As a result, she was executed by guillotine
~ ~ ~
Barbara Mckernan
POD (Poem Of the Day)
~Today I am The thought of myself In my Mothers forehead… May I listen to the voice of the messenger Bringing her song up from the dead – A silver star bruised & hanging on a cloud As I roll gold into life Like the scarab & stand with the flowering hawthorn on the obsidian altar… ~hag
~ ~ ~
Jyoti Thomas.
“…If you want to grow a plant, you take a tiny seed and lay it in the
soil. The whole plant, the whole life of the plant is compressed into this tiny
seed. What comes out of this seed? First, the root. The life expands into the
root. But then it contracts again and grows, still in a state of contraction,
into a stem. Then it expands and the leaves come and then the blossom. Then
there is again contraction into the seed and the seed waits until the following
year. In the plant, therefore, we see a process of expansion — contraction;
expansion — contraction.
Whenever the plant expands, it is the Sun which draws out the leaf or the blossom; whenever the plant contracts (in the seed or the stem) the contraction is due to the forces of the Moon. Between the leaves, the Moon is working. So that when we take a plant with spreading leaves and root, we can say, beginning with the seed: Moon — then Sun — again Moon — again Sun — again Moon, and so forth … with the Moon at the end of the process. In every plant we see Sun forces and Moon forces working in alternation. In a field of growing plants we behold the deeds of Sun and Moon” ~ Rudolf Steiner
~~~
Sunday 19 May 2019, 2 pm – 4 pm- Social Sculpture Workshop around the ‘URPFLANZE’ with Victoria Martin. at the Rudolf Steiner branch 4249 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago 60618
$20 for art supplies + Snacks to Share Encouraged
***
Yoram Raanan
Sat. 25 May 2019 – 7 pm – 9 pm
Climbing Jacobs Ladder: The ‘Easter Paradox’ & The Feast of Ascension
Leading Thoughts & Social Sculpture with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg
$10 Donation & Snacks to Share Encouraged at the Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago 60618
Eurythmy: AUM = A – I stand for myself, U- I stand for humanity, M – I stand for Life
Social Sculpture: Steiner’s ‘Blue Dot Exercise’: Through Art, the bridge between science & spirit, we warm the ‘I’, to open the heart, in support of healthy community.
What are my gifts-What are my tools? How can I place them in right relationship within the social realm? How can I hone them to strengthen and enhance the world?
Enter the Labyrinth of Vitae Sophia: Human hearts, once warmed, can rise up to meet the source of wisdom, like flowers turning toward the sun.
Living into the Foundation Stone of Love: How can we take our individual Inner Whitsun & expand it, into what Steiner calls the “World Festival of Knowledge” a path leading from ‘Sprit Recollection’, to ‘Sprit Sensing’, to ‘Sprit Beholding’?
Sunday 2 June 2019, 2 pm – 4 pm at the Rudolf Steiner branch 4249 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago 60618
also
10 am – 1 pm Saturday 8 June 2019 -4804 Sewanee Road, Nashville, TN 37220. for more info. contact Cathy Green cgreen@grasslandaquatics.com
also
12 Noon Potluck, Program 1 pm -4 pm Whitsunday 9 June 2019, In Knoxville, TN. for more info. contact William Rogers wmerogers@gmail.com
also
11-12 June 2019, Ashville, TN. for more info. contact Marnie Muller
*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg is the founder of the website and blog Reverse Ritual – Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year (www.reverseritual.com). She is an Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Trans-denominational Minister, and “Anthroposopher.” She works as the Festivals Coordinator & Council Member of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch as well as with the Traveling Speakers Program, and she serves on the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society.
‘Preparation, Illumination & Initiation’ – The Rosy Cross
Incorporating ‘The Golden Legend’, & the Plant vs. Human Kingdoms, To enliven our work with ‘The Rose Cross Meditation’.
Using our head, hands & heart we will enact this powerful Rosicrucian tool given to us by Rudolf Steiner, as a soul path of initiation, using imaginative cognition to build spiritual etheric forces; a Metamorphoses of Self & of World.
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg – Founder of Reverse Ritual Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year. Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Trans-denominational Minister, Anthroposopher, working as the Festivals Coordinator & Council Member of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch, The Traveling Speakers Program, & the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society.
30 April 2019 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Arcturus is the brightest star high in the east these evenings. Spica shines lower right of it by about three fists. To the right of Spica by half that distance is the distinctive four-star constellation of Corvus, the Crow of Spring.
Lynnette Shelley
As Mars marches eastward across Taurus this week, it approaches the two stars that represent the Bull’s horns: Beta & Zeta Tauri. This evening, the Red Planet forms an isosceles triangle with the pair.
Walpurgis Night, In Germanic folklore Walpurgisnacht, also called Hexennacht, literally “Witches’ Night” – the eve of the feast day of Saint Walpurga, an 8th-century abbess in Francia. In Goethe’s Faust we see 2 scenes: ‘Romantic Walpurgis Night’ the night of a witches’ meeting on the Brocken, the highest peak in the Harz Mountains, a range of wooded hills in central Germany; and later in Part 2 a ‘Classical Walpurgis Night’ is featured.
65 – Seneca, teacher of Nero, murdered
1789 – On the balcony of Federal Hall on Wall Street in New York City, George Washington takes the oath of office to become the first elected President of the United States.
1812 – Birthday of the enigmatic Kaspar Hauser
1877 – Birthday of Alice B. Toklas, an American-born member of the Parisian avant-garde of the early 20th century. Life partner of American writer Gertrude Stein
1885 – The Niagara Reservation becomes New York’s first state park, ensuring that Niagara Falls will not be devoted solely to industrial & commercial use
1939 – The 1939-40 New York World’s Fair opens
1945 – Adolf Hitler commits suicide
1963 – The Bristol Bus Boycott is held to protest
the Company’s refusal to employ Black or Asian bus crews, drawing national
attention to racial discrimination in the United Kingdom
***
Arthur Rackham
POD (Poem Of
the Day) for Flora on Beltane:
May Day Maya
Pleiadian Goddess
Bright light of the 7 Sisters
Mountain Nymph transformed,
We ascend your beacon mound
& kindle there
The oakwood of the Bel-Fire
To rival the Sun
& call the Summer heat.
Zeus’s lover
Hermes Mother
Inspire processions
Of chimney sweeps & milkmaids
To leap the healing flames
& sky-clad singing:
“Ride a cock horse to Banburry Cross
To see a fine lady on a white horse”
Walk the circuit
& beat the bounds
With the young Summer King
& the Queen of the May
For the feast of flowers
Is calling forth the consort
Come, come, come unto me
& celebrate with the orders of Elementals.
Bold maidens bathing in the dew of May morn
Sword dancing & singing
In deep forest frivolity
Striking open ancient ley lines in bulls-eye archery
Marking the unrestrained tryst,
A Maypole in Holy-Rood-Mass
Wrapped & weaved in ribbons & ivy
For the May-Eve rites.
Robin Hood makes ready the hunt,
Maid Marian has gone-a-Maying.
~Lady Hazel
***
This is the Eve of Beltane or May Day. Beltane, the old Celtic name for May Day, means bright fire or fire of Bel, the name of the Solar force, whose feast marks the beginning of the 2nd half of the year.
Wood from 9 sacred trees is gathered, & the great Bel-fire is built & ritualistically ignited by the High priestess or Arch-Druid. People would jump these ‘need-fires’ for fertility, healing & protection.
Torches lit from it were carried home to re-light the hearth fires. The folk would walk their animals in-between them to ensure a productive season – this is the mating season after all for man & beast.
There were other May Day customs, like walking the circuit of one’s property, repairing fences & boundary markers, processions of all kinds, archery tournaments, Morris dances, sword play, & of course making merry with music & drinking.
May morning is a time when the veil between the worlds can easily be pushed aside; but instead of the spirits coming into our realm from the other side, which is the case with Halloween, the polar opposite of Mayday on the wheel of the year -the fairies can enchant us over into their mystical realms.
This is a magical time, perfect for gathering ‘wild’ water, especially the May morning dew, or water from hidden wells & springs. These wild waters were collected & used to bath in for beauty, or to drink for health.
May Day is considered the start of summer – the time of milk & honey. This sensuous fertile energy is totally universal, & can be applied on many different levels. When we acknowledge these creative forces in the dance of our lives, it takes us to our own personal, modern-day version of dancing around the maypole, where we weave & combine the opposing energies within ourselves, blending them into one balanced source.
So yes, whether you know it or not, there will be at least one song that plays in your sub-conscious head on this eve of the 1st day of May, when you become perhaps, the Queen of the May, or Jack-in the Green. Our body like the body of the earth instinctively knows its Beltane, the time of vitality & passion & new growth. And the wisdom of our spirit seeks the natural union of polarities that occur at this time, giving us the opportunity for integration, in the alchemical dance of our souls…
Because
under all the sexual innuendo & frivolity, it’s really all about the inner
mystic marriage, the union of fire & water -opposites complimenting each
other, to become one, bringing all the elements into balance.
You’ll just
have to go dancing naked in the forest preserve on your own time…
For now, let’s work to unify the polarities of our being, by sparking the new fire of creative fertility & passion, & marrying it with the beautiful, healing waters of compassion & pure love. So we can truly celebrate the marriage feast of our lives, with a grounded, mindful joy.
So if it is
your will – light your Bel-fire, marry it to the water, by floating it in the
chalice of your choice. Take the time you need there…To do or not, what you
will…Whisper your marriage vows into the water…or dance the 1st dance…or
smash the glass…whatever your ceremony calls for…short simple or
silent…it doesn’t matter…a 3 day bacchanal, with dancing puppets…it’s all
good…cause it’s all about what’s inside…
10 am – 1 pm Saturday 8 June 2019 -4804 Sewanee Road, Nashville, TN 37220. for more info. contact Cathy Green cgreen@grasslandaquatics.com
also
12 Noon Potluck, Program 1 pm -4 pm Whitsunday 9 June 2019, In Knoxville, TN. for more info. contact William Rogers wmerogers@gmail.com
also
7 pm – 10 pm 11 June 2019, Ashville, TN. for more info. contact Marnie Muller
Eurythmy: AUM = A – I stand for myself, U- I stand for humanity, M – I stand for Life
Social Sculpture: Steiner’s ‘Blue Dot Exercise’: Through Art, the bridge between science & spirit, we warm the ‘I’, to open the heart, in support of healthy community.
What are my gifts-What are my tools? How can I place them in right relationship within the social realm? How can I hone them to strengthen and enhance the world?
Enter the Labyrinth of Vitae Sophia: Human hearts, once warmed, can rise up to meet the source of wisdom, like flowers turning toward the sun.
Living into the Foundation Stone of Love: How can we take our individual Inner Whitsun & expand it, into what Steiner calls the “World Festival of Knowledge” a path leading from ‘Sprit Recollection’, to ‘Sprit Sensing’, to ‘Sprit Beholding’?
*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg is the founder of the website and blog Reverse Ritual – Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year (www.reverseritual.com). She is an Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Trans-denominational Minister, and “Anthroposopher.” She works as the Festivals Coordinator & Council Member of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch as well as with the Traveling Speakers Program, and she serves on the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society.
29 April 2019 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Just after dark, the Sickle of Leo stands vertical, high in the south. Its bottom star is Regulus, the brightest of Leo. In second place is yellow Algieba above it. The Lion is walking horizontally westward. The Sickle forms his front leg, chest, mane, & part of his head. Denebola, in the tip of the Lion’s tail, which was featured in connection with the Vernal Full Moon, is once more revealed for our contemplation…
***
“Appearance of St.. Catherine and Michael to Joan of Arc,” by Hermann Stilke (Left-hand panel of his Joan of Arc triptych)
Feast Day of Saint Endelienta, a Cornish saint of the 5th century. She is believed to be a daughter of the Welsh King Brychan, & legend says that she was a goddaughter of King Arthur. She lived as a hermit at Trentinney where she subsisted on the milk of a cow.
Giovanni-di-Paolo
1380 – Death
Day of Catherine of Siena, Italian
mystic, philosopher, a Scholastic philosopher & theologian & saint. She
is believed to have had miraculous visions & felt herself to be united in
marriage with Jesus.
Born as the
Black Death-ravaged in Siena, Italy, to Lapa Piagenti, the daughter of a local
poet, & Giacomo di Benincasa, a cloth dyer who ran his enterprise with the
help of his sons. Lapa was about forty years old when she gave premature birth
to twin daughters Catherine & Giovanna. She had already borne 22 children,
but half of them had died. Giovanna was handed over to a wet-nurse & died
soon after. Catherine was nursed by her mother & developed into a healthy
child. She was two years old when Lapa had her 25th child, another daughter
named Giovanna. As a child Catherine was so merry that the family gave her the
pet name of “Euphrosyne”, which is Greek for “joy” &
the name of an early Christian saint.
Catherine
had her first vision of Christ when she was five or six years old: She & a
brother were on the way home from visiting a married sister when she is said to
have experienced a vision of Christ seated in glory with the Apostles Peter,
Paul, & JohnAt age seven, Catherine vowed to give her whole life to God.
When
Catherine was sixteen, her older sister Bonaventura died in childbirth; already
anguished by this, Catherine soon learned that her parents wanted her to marry
Bonaventura’s widower. She was absolutely opposed & started a massive fast,
& cut off her long hair as a protest.
“Build
a cell inside your mind, from which you can never flee.” In this inner
cell she made her father into a representation of Christ, her mother into the
Blessed Virgin Mary, & her brothers into the apostles. Serving them humbly
became an opportunity for spiritual growth. She chose to live an active &
prayerful life outside a convent’s walls following the model of the Dominicans.
Eventually her father gave up & permitted her to live as she pleased.
Her custom
of giving away clothing &food without asking anyone’s permission cost her
family significantly, but she demanded nothing for herself.
In about
1368, age twenty-one, Catherine experienced what she described in her letters as
a “Mystical Marriage” with Jesus. Catherine received, not the ring of
gold & jewels that her biographer reports in his version, but the ring of
Christ’s foreskin.” Catherine herself mentions the foreskin-as-wedding
ring motif in one of her letters, equating the wedding ring of a virgin with a
foreskin; she typically claimed that her own wedding ring to Christ was simply
invisible
As social &
political tensions mounted in Siena, Catherine found herself drawn to intervene
in wider politics. She began travelling with her followers throughout northern &
central Italy advocating reform of the clergy & advising people that
repentance &renewal could be done through “the total love for God.” In
Pisa, in 1375, she used what influence she had to sway that city & Lucca
away from alliance with the anti-papal league whose force was gaining momentum &
strength. It was in Pisa that she received the stigmata.
She received the Holy Eucharist almost daily. This extreme fasting appeared unhealthy in the eyes of the clergy & her own sisterhood. Her confessor ordered her to eat properly. But Catherine claimed that she was unable to, describing her inability to eat as an infermità (illness). From the beginning of 1380, Catherine could neither eat nor swallow water. On February 26 she lost the use of her legs. St Catherine died in Rome, on 29 April 1380, at the age of thirty-three, having suffered a stroke eight days earlier.
1429 – Joan of Arc – the Maid of Orléans,
defeats the English which begins the process that ended with England’s complete
expulsion from the continent.
“It was necessary that the
Maid of Orleans went through a kind of unaware initiation to fulfill her
historical mission.It concerned an
initiation that could take place in the time of the thirteen nights between the
25th December and 6th January.In the last time before
birth the human being is especially accessible to unaware influences from the
spiritual world.
On the 6th January the
Maid of Orleans was born, to whom the Christ Impulse was implanted just before
she saw the physical sunlight.The Maid of Orleans
intervened in the course of history in such a way that everything that happened
later was determined through it.
The whole map of Europe
would be different, also the spiritual life if the English had won.
The Maid was a servant of
St. Michael. She was a warrior of his Will and brought this spiritual will to
Earth by her determination and actions.In the Central European
civilisation were the springs for the whole spiritual culture of the future,
the foundation of the ego-culture.
The human ego had to
enkindle itself in the outside world, to be awake and realised internally. Thus
the ego-culture of Central Europe was aroused from the objective events, the
heroic sacrifices, that have brought the changes into etheric bodies and
continue to do so, through the recorded memory.
It is necessary that, there would be souls, who send thoughts into the spiritual world like extending arms and bring down the consciousness from the spiritual world, souls conscious of spirit.The proper purpose of all our endevours is to gain a living connection between the physical and spiritual worlds.
From the courage of the fighters,
From the blood of the battles,
From the grief of the bereaved,
From the nation’s sacrifices
Will grow up the fruits of spirit
If souls aware of spirit turn
Their senses to the spirit land.”
~Rudolf Steiner, Spiritual Science, a Necessity for the Present
Time, The Relation of Man to his Folk Soul – Nuremberg, March 13, 1915, GA 159
“In order to throw a little light on
the occult understanding of history, we may ask the question: What would the
development of modern Europe have been if at the beginning of the 15th century
the Maid of Orleans had not entered the arena of events? Anyone who thinks,
even from an entirely external point of view, of the development that took
place during this period, must say to himself: Suppose the deeds of the Maid of
Orleans were erased from history … then, according to the knowledge
obtainable from purely external historical research, one cannot but realise
that without the working of higher, super-sensible Powers through the Maid of
Orleans, the whole of France, indeed the whole of Europe in the 15th century,
would have taken on an altogether different form. Everything in the impulses of
will, in the physical brains of those times, was directed towards flooding all
Europe with a general conception of the State which would have extinguished the
folk-individualities and under this influence a very great deal of what has
developed in Europe during the last centuries through the interplay of these
folk-individualities would quite certainly have been impossible.
Imagine the deed of the Maid of
Orleans blotted out from history, France abandoned to her fate without this
intervention, and then ask: Without this deed, what would have become of
France? And then think of the role played by France in the whole cultural life
of humanity during the centuries following! Add to this the facts which cannot
be refuted and are confirmed by actual documents concerning the mission of the
Maid of Orleans. This young girl, certainly not highly educated even by the
standards of her time, suddenly, before she is twenty years old, feels in the
autumn of 1428 that spiritual Powers of the super-sensible worlds are speaking
to her. True, she clothes these Powers in forms that are familiar to her, so
that she is seeing them through the medium of her own mental images; but that
does not do away with the reality of these Powers. Picture to yourselves that
she knows that super-sensible Powers are guiding her will towards a definite
point — I am speaking to begin with, not of what can be told about these facts
from the Akasha Chronicle, but only of what is confirmed by documentary
evidence.
We know that the Maid of Orleans
confided her vision first of all to a relative who — one would almost say, by
chance-happened to understand her; that after many vicissitudes and
difficulties she was introduced to the Court of King Charles who, together with
the whole French Army, had come to his wit’s end, as the saying goes. We know
too, how after every conceivable obstacle had been put in her way, she finally
recognised and went straight to the King, who was standing among such a crowd
of people that no physical eye could have distinguished him. It is also known
that at that moment she confided to him something— he wanted to test her by it
— of which it can be said that it was known only to him and to the
super-sensible worlds. You also know from ordinary history that it was she who,
under the unceasing impulse and urge of her intense faith — it would be better
to say, through her actual vision — and in face of the greatest difficulties,
led the armies to victory and the King to his crowning.
Who intervened at that time in the
course of history? — None other than Beings of higher Hierarchies! The Maid of
Orleans was an outer Instrument of these Beings, and it was they who guided the
deeds of history”.
~Rudolf Steiner, Occult History, Lecture 2, Stuttgart, 28th December 1910
1862 –The Capture of New Orleans by Union forces in the American Civil War.
1899 – Birthday of Duke Ellington, American pianist, composer, & bandleader
1901 – Birthday of Hirohito, Japanese emperor
1910 – The
Parliament of the United Kingdom passes the People’s Budget, the first budget in British history with the
expressed intent of redistributing wealth among the British public
1945 –The German army in Italy unconditionally surrenders to the Allies.
1945 – Adolf Hitler marries his longtime partner Eva Braun in a Berlin bunker they both commit suicide the following day
1945 – Dachau concentration camp is liberated
by United States troops
1991 – A cyclone strikes the Chittagong district
of southeastern Bangladesh with winds of around 155 miles per hour killing at
least 238,000 people &leaving as many as 10 million homeless
1991 – The 7.0 Mw earthquake affects Georgia with a maximum intensity killing 370 people
1992 –Riots
in Los Angeles, following the acquittal of police officers charged with
excessive force in the beating of Rodney
King. Over the next three days 53 people are killed & hundreds of
buildings are destroyed
***
Circle song:
~What mystery is unfolding In the heart-fires we are holding In our hand we our molding A new destiny… ~hag
***
Thought of the day:
Michael supports us with the courage to die into Christ,
while still living in the world. Can we come to understand & live into the
principle of Resurrection that continues to grow within & around us, even
if all we can see is the death process?
Just as the April showers swell the seed in a gradual
surrender to life. I find I must continuously, & conscientiously choose to
let go, & open to the greening, allowing my whole being to become a vessel for
the fulfillment of the Resurrection, allowing The Risen Christ to teach me – thru
Nature, thru other human beings, & thru my Higher-Self.
And always my question is: What does this look like as a lifestyle, as a right livelihood, as a Shared festival?…As a community experience, honoring & furthering the Resurrection, by aligning our will with the Divine Will – Learning to serve from a place of wholehearted listening…& a practice of, not I, but Christ in me…
***
Tuesday 7 May 2019 in Ann Arbor Michigan
& also
Sat. 25 May 2019 – 7 pm – 9 pm in Chicago
Climbing Jacobs Ladder: Celebrating the Feast of Ascension
Leading Thoughts & original art-collage projections with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg
10 am – 1 pm Saturday 8 June 2019 -4804 Sewanee Road, Nashville, TN 37220. for more info. contact Cathy Green cgreen@grasslandaquatics.com
also
12 Noon Potluck, Program 1 pm -4 pm Whitsunday 9 June 2019, In Knoxville, TN. for more info. contact William Rogers wmerogers@gmail.com
also
7 pm – 10 pm 11 June 2019, Ashville, TN. for more info. contact Marnie Muller
Eurythmy: AUM = A – I stand for myself, U- I stand for humanity, M – I stand for Life
Social Sculpture: Steiner’s ‘Blue Dot Exercise’: Through Art, the bridge between science & spirit, we warm the ‘I’, to open the heart, in support of healthy community.
What are my gifts-What are my tools? How can I place them in right relationship within the social realm? How can I hone them to strengthen and enhance the world?
Enter the Labyrinth of Vitae Sophia: Human hearts, once warmed, can rise up to meet the source of wisdom, like flowers turning toward the sun.
Living into the Foundation Stone of Love: How can we take our individual Inner Whitsun & expand it, into what Steiner calls the “World Festival of Knowledge” a path leading from ‘Sprit Recollection’, to ‘Sprit Sensing’, to ‘Sprit Beholding’?
*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg is the founder of the website and blog Reverse Ritual – Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year (www.reverseritual.com). She is an Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Trans-denominational Minister, and “Anthroposopher.” She works as the Festivals Coordinator & Council Member of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch as well as with the Traveling Speakers Program, and she serves on the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society.
22 April 2019 – “Speaking with the Stars“: The Lyrid meteor shower, usually weak to begin with, will mostly be blocked by bright Bella Luna during the shower’s early-morning active hours tonight & tomorrow night. So look for Jupiter close to the waning gibbous Moon.
***
Music is the expression of the will of nature while all other arts are expressions of the idea of nature. ~Rudolf Steiner
254 – Deathday of Origen (which means *child of Horus* -his nickname was Adamantios which means *unconquerable*, *diamond*) – Church father considered a heretic because of his belief in reincarnation.
1145 – the 19th recorded perihelion passage of Halley’s Comet
1451 – Birthday of Isabella I, of Castile, Queen of Spain
1724 – Birthday of philosopher Immanuel Kant
1840 – Birthday of painter Odilon Redon
1904 – Birthday of physicist J.R. Oppenheimer
1915
– The use of poison gas in World War I escalates when chlorine gas is released
as a chemical weapon in the Second Battle
of Ypres
1945 –Prisoners at the Jasenovac concentration camp revolt. 520 are killed & around 80 escape
1945 –Führerbunker: After learning that Soviet forces have taken Eberswalde without a fight, Adolf Hitler admits defeat in his underground bunker & states that suicide is his only recourse
1954 – Red Scare: Witnesses begin testifying and live television coverage of the Army–McCarthy hearings begins
1970- 1stEarth Day “There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth. We are all crew.” ~Marshall McLuhan
“We
can speak of Karma not only in the case of individual persons, for man should
not consider himself as a single being. If the individual were to rise even a
few miles above the earth, the result would be the same as if the finger
severed itself from the body.
If
we penetrate into spiritual science we are literally forced to admit through
this knowledge that we should not delude ourselves to the extent of insisting
that we are single beings. This applies to the physical world and even more to
the spiritual world. Man belongs to the whole world and his destiny is involved
with that of the entire world. Karma touches not only the individual, but also
the life of whole nations.”
~Will you Sow the seeds of premonition Into a fruitful action To ignite the weave In radiant expectation…? ~hag
***
John Muir is remembered on Earthday (his birthday was April 21st1838
) also known as “John of the Mountains”, an American naturalist,
author, environmental philosopher, glaciologist & early advocate for the
preservation of wilderness in the United States. His letters, essays, & books
describing his adventures in nature, especially in the Sierra Nevada, have been
read by millions. His activism has helped to preserve the Yosemite Valley,
Sequoia National Park & many other wilderness areas.
The Sierra Club, which he founded, is a prominent American
conservation organization. The 211-mile John Muir hiking trail in the Sierra
Nevada, was named in his honor, along with Muir Woods National Monument, Muir Beach, John
Muir College, Mount Muir, Camp Muir & Muir Glacier.
Muir
was noted for being an ecological thinker, political spokesman, & religious
prophet, whose writings became a personal guide into nature for countless
individuals, making his name “almost ubiquitous” in the modern
environmental consciousness.
During his lifetime John Muir published over 300 articles &
12 books. Muir has been called the “patron saint of the American
wilderness” & its “archetypal free spirit.” As a dreamer &
activist, his eloquent words changed the way Americans saw their mountains,
forests, seashores,& deserts.
Muir
exalted wild nature over human culture and civilization, believing that all
life was sacred. He moved beyond the Transcendentalism of Emerson to a
“biocentric perspective on the world”. He did so by describing the
natural world as “a conductor of divinity,” & his writings often
made nature synonymous with God.
My
dear sisters & brothers, let’s make every day Earth day!
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