Well, What Faith Are You?

What's In A Faith? Posted by Reverend Mary Miller on Wednesday, February 8, 2012 Under: Spirituality A little more about us, our passion... I spent a great deal of time really trying to iron out what we believe.  Why?  Perhaps it's middle age angst, but mostly it's because I didn't want to disillusion either my readers, or myself in where we stand spiritually.  It may seem trivial to some, but to many may be something they find they are struggling with themselves, or even to just help clarify any ambiguousness of who we are, what we serve, and why. I have found over the years that clarity of faith can be a tough thing. In our years on this Earth, we accumulate many things, and some of them are our carpet bag of wisdom we live by, how we meld them together to create who we are. For one, it truly takes a gift to "only be a 'x'".  This refers I guess to folks that go to church on Sunday, they have been going since they were in diapers, it's their faith and they are content with this. I have seen this with monks, who with their love of Buddha have a single focus towards their faith, without added material from other places. I have never had a single path that was the only wisdom or focus.  Even as a child, I found that the closest I could find, was my love of nature, that always seemed to literally throw me into a vibratory union withSpirit. The same could be said of music;  I literally have found music touches me to my very core, and literally can get lost for hours in it, either due to lyrics or sound alone. In journeying, and Dream work, I found there is a union between ecstatic state, a state found by the Sufis in spinning, by Buddhist in Mediation (which I do partake), Hindus in Chanting (same partake), and in Samadhi (a state of complete union of self and spirit/god), which I found I can go into with music/nature, and spent a glorious week in this state uninterrupted. So are we shamans?  No.  While I can claim a genetic trace to this faith:  my grandfather was from Vardo, Norway; a Saami link in my life, I do not use journey work or soul retrieval as method of working with clients. This path is probably the closest to what I am. I believe in nature, I talk to nature; rocks, giving back--either in tobacco or something, in exchange.  I believe in prayer and drumming.  Are we Wiccan?  No.  We certainly believe in both Female/Male as Mother Nature, we do not do circle work, asking for God/dess to appear in a ritual.  We do believe in the land cycle of equinoxes, and the cycle of living close to the land.  We do not conjure, nor do cast spells. Are we Christian? No.  We respect the work Jesus did, we believe in the mystic or "gnostic" idea of Jesus, that "look under a rock, and you will find me.." refers to the fact that Christ nature (anointed one)  is within us, around us, through us, and is us. Are we Hindu?  No.  I have studied this faith for years, agree with many tenants of this faith, but do not have a guru nor feel that this faith is my only link to God/Oneness. Are we Buddhist?  No. As that Buddhist have a very strict path, requiring vegetarianism, (which we aren't), recitation of the 4 nobile truths, and so forth.  I do meditate, which crosses paths, I do believe in the AUM mantra, and I have tibetan prayer flags hanging outside.  I revere the Dali Lama, and believe in reincarnation. Are we New Age?  No.  While many philosophies we certainly believe in, many within new age does not fit our path.  We very much believe in Tarot, Channeling, in Alchemy, in Quantum Physics, in reincarnation, meditation, the power of stones, herbs, chanting, but not in all aspects of New Age.  For one, (I will do a separate post on this), I don't believe 'that we alone create our experience or world'.  Why?  I don't subscribe to the lack of compassion that I have found with this taking in consideration critical thinking. If we alone were responsible (soley) for our world, I have only one name to mention: Hitler.  Why would folks believe that we would be so spiritually bereft we would 'create' catastrophic killing on such a massive level. That is just one example. I will agree we make our sadness/happiness (how we respond to the world/lessons we learn), but certainly not all the situations we are given, as mentioned above.  What we choose to do about the situations we face, certainly is our responsibility, and I believe when we know better, we do better.  No judgement, no shame. I have Buddhas around my house reminding me of our divine source, and angels, knowing that i certainly do channel, and have instructed by spirit to keep that door open.  I believe we are spirits having human experience (CS Lewis quote), learning and growing. I truly thank my fellow spiritual/life partner Raymond, for exploring this journey with me.  We spent a night really going over, what are we?  What do we believe?  In order to get a better grasp on our own spiritual journey and focus.  I think this is a darn good idea.  Often we sway in the wind with what we read, what we hear other's believe, without ever taking an inventory of what exactly do we focus our spiritual development on, what differing paths do we follow and how they interweave in our lives. I hope you take some time to reflect, that this brings you peace and joy into you All Peace to you.

To Die for Enlightenment

To Die for Enlightenment

I want to talk today about the death of a spiritual seeker. I have no happy title for this, because, in frank, loosing a seeker is not something to reward a group, a guru or a spiritual ideology.  He died looking for enlightenment in the Arizona desert, living off the land with his girlfriend at the insistence of a "Roshi" named Roach.


This is not the first time this has happened to well meaning individuals looking for ultimate happiness and spiritual oneness, and sadly I'd bet the house, car and my bank account, this won't be the last person to find transcendence in passing from this world before finding unity of body-spirit-mind.


After spending years in an ashram, dedicating myself to reading, practicing and finding all I can spiritually about Truth, I've found that many use the words, and few actually achieve they are discussing. When actual conversation happens, often it is wordless, leading to an ecstatic state, with or without a teacher, but definitely leaves an indelible mark on the aspirant.


In "Brother Sun, Sister Moon", (1972) a movie about St Francis of Assisi, the back story to this clip is that Francis has denounced his family, his wealth, and standing in Assisi, after returning sick from the Crusades. Prior to war, he was very much into gambling, women, wealth and pleasures of life.  In an epiphany, due to near death experience, he receives a voice from God to change. He is at church one Sunday and sees Christ's eyes open on a closed eye Jesus on the cross, giving his vision:  "Francis rebuild my church, can't you see it's in dis-repair." Later seeing San Damiano, he determines to physically fix the church. (Please realize that the exact words that were in the vision were more or less what was said, as St Francis never wrote down these words).

Here is the clip to explain St Francis's comment to his soon to be disciple, St Bernard. 


Sadly, there is more truth to the statement. Oftentimes I hear folks huff and puff spiritually with complicated answers to things (we) teach.  I find that the more complicated or over simplistic the answer, the less they really have experienced (or sometimes know). In reality, no one really knows until they've achieved a certain state (I think of the comment from the Bible; "for him (he) who has ears, let him hear."), you just "know" the answer.


  I think of folks like Ananda-Mayi ma, (see picture below), her ecstasy in samadhi is rather obvious, at least to me;

for the followers of "Ma", her ability to go into a state of complete oneness transcended all words. Yet for herself, she never knew of a time when she felt apart from the divine.  She was there, she embodied what she knew.

In interviews she constantly stated that, "she did "nothing" that would bring her to this state, but the state came to her."

For Francis of Assisi's transformation (by going to youtube you can click to see the full movie), again was not something he actively looked for, in fact with the abuse given to him by his family, previous 'so called' friends, as well as the possibility of being burned at the stake for a heretic, his conversion was directed by spirit, not by man.

What's my point?   I think that the drive to be connected to the divine comes from within, from spirit.  Whether or not we experience the state experienced by Saints (I am capitalizing on purpose) in our lives really is outside of our control (having a sense of 'oneness' oftentimes referred to in Hindu and Buddhist terms as samadhi ). It is an active state that comes and goes of its own will. 

When it is not present, often people experience a sense of separateness that is often referred to as "dark night of the soul" that includes doubt of God's existence, regret and extreme depression (Mother Theresa discussed this late in her life) seems to go hand in hand with the level of oneness achieved.  This is not stating that Bipolar condition is the bounce of these two states, because balance of life, having clear thought can differentiate the state, but leaves me wondering sometimes of teachers who put their students at risk.

The teacher should be there to help guide the student who has had this experience or quick glimpse of oneness. The glimpse is valid of its own accord, teacher or no. The point of the teacher it seems from my experience, (entered an ecstatic state for 10 days) should be to teach the student how to balance what they've seen with terra firma (life right here and now) to deal with loss when they experience that state, and teach good skills that balances the two.

When teacher is greedy, controlling and in search of fame, the student will most definitely suffer, as this poor couple found out in Arizona.  I know his wife/girl friend will take a longtime to recover (not to mention other members of his family) from this so called renunciation that was instructed by his teacher; dehydration is certainly not part of any spiritual path that I know of.

I sincerely hope that his family, wife and friends find a resolved peace for his passing. It is sad that he needed to go from this Earth so early, and perhaps in a needless way.