Advent Eve's Nascent Life Vigil

Last night I participated in the world-wide vigil for nascent human Life –“Life not yet born.” There were no bright lights, no large video screens, no gut wrenching images displayed before us; no, with eyes closed and heads bowed, together we meditated, prayed, pondered, and listened with ears and hearts wide open to the essence of emerging Life not only in wombs throughout world, but that within our very own beings in need of protection, care and nurturing.

I love it that this vigil for Nascent Life was held on Advent’s Eve.

Divine Patience Unconditional Love

Seems "unconditional Love" has more to do with "unconditional Patience" ...quiet, divinely expectant...patience - more so perhaps than any other expression of Love -rare in human terms and deeper somehow than simple lack of expectations.

Patiently waiting
Keren

I have probably seen you before in my mirror.

Our experiences may be different, but we are all the same at the core...perhaps it is our soul, the dna or the imprint of our Creator...hmmm. I joined a group of people who...well to put it simply... we visit and share communion, mutual presence and the Word with a group of ladies lets just say "in unfortunate cirmcumstance." The suprising thing to me is that when I look at their faces they all look so familiar to me, each one...I know I know her..I know I must have met her or seen her before, etc. ...and I realize it is the look in their eyes and the expressions on their faces I recognize because I have indeed seen them all before in my very own mirror, in my own eyes and on my own face.Our experiences may be different, but we are all the same at the core...perhaps it is our soul, the dna or the imprint of our Creator...hmmm. I joined a group of people who...well to put it simply... we visit and share communion, mutual presence and the Word with a group of ladies lets just say "in unfortunate cirmcumstance." The suprising thing to me is that when I look at their faces they all look so familiar to me, each one...I know I know her..I know I must have met her or seen her before, etc. ...and I realize it is the look in their eyes and the expressions on their faces I recognize because I have indeed seen them all before in my very own mirror, in my own eyes and on my own face.



Peace
Keren

True Love is Forever - somepeople remain in your hearts forever

I remember the first time I read anything Jim Palmer wrote. It has to be 4 years ago maybe 5 and was an article on ExploreFaith.com abotu Divine Nobodies and it was the first time I read any Protestant-type write about Jesus and Love in a sort-of similar way to my own Catholic pastor who was the first Anybody of any background I ever heard talk about Jesus and Love in the way that he did/does...i just happend to hear him on the radio. But that is another Love story.



Im dedicating this post to Jim Palmer. I still see him on Facebook. I still dont understand why he doesnt post those posts here too though. But you dont have to understand everything about a person or God or anything to Love it/them/him/her, and I am learning that is not my concern...I cant see his big picture any more than I can see my own.



I started posting on Jim's Myspace several years ago, and then a wonderful thing happend. He asked me to post on his Turnloveinsideout website blog. That was the first time anybody had ever asked me to express my thoughts on Love. I have said this before and i will keep saying it forever... I am eternally grateful for that. He asked me to do something, and that allowed expression of things I may have kept inside. For whatever that is worth to anybody else, probably nothing, but to me it has had immeasureable value, and I continue to learn and grow from the experience of sharing in this way.



I believe if it is our destiny, aka if God wants us to do something, he will let us know and we will do it..in His time. I also believe he uses other people most of the time to act on his behalf - since we - all of us - are made in His image. People who ask us, seek us out, and knock on our door - we will open up eventually. I am grateful to Jim Palmer for having the courage to ask me when he did and for all the various ways it has deepend and opened my faith.

In His Time, In His Way

I imagine sometimes that perhpas before each of us are born to this Earthly world, we each are ourselves i.e. simply God's' creation..Eve or Adam or a combination of both... perhaps we choose this separation from God assuming we could handle life on our own...just like they did. And our mission .. if we choose to accept it....is to recognize something like this.. "I cant handle it.. I want You to be God and me to just be Yours." Thankfull that He came as Jesus to show us His way and to take us back...in His Time, In His Way...

We're all in this together, n'est-ce pas?

We're all in this together, whatever it is.
Can we ever be separated from each other?
I say no.
Forget wrongness for a moment
(whatever you conceive that to be).
As children of the same Creator,
belonging to the same Mystery philosophers, scientists, spiritualists all chase after ie, obedience to completeness, peace, Love, wisdom,
desire to know or just be,
freedom, truth...
Bottom line, we're all in this together.

Being A Lover Sometimes Means Accepting Somebody Elses Attached Strings

To me “unconditional love” is a divine way to love and a wonderful one. To me, “being a lover” is different. Being a “lover” pretty much necessitates a response. Somebody who will lay their head on your chest and actually listen to the beat of your heart, or hold your hand and feel your pulse or look into your eyes and read their own reflection in the eyes looking back at them….thats being a lover, not just a way to love. Just IMHO.

More notes on love. You know, I do have expectations of love. I expect people who say they love me and want the best for me, to not intentionally exclude me, or to not treat me cruelly or not manipulate me. I expect people who claim to love me and claim to want the best for me to share with me the loving respect they share with the upmost important people in their lives. I know people fall short of this, me too. I have expectations and regrets, and that to me is what life, truth and freedom is all about. Loving Freely sometimes comes with Strings. Sometimes Strings are what hold things together, when Love doesnt seem to be there.

“Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.” {Mark Twain}

Sweet fresh fragrance of Forgiveness.

Sweetness.

It seems mere humans, like me, have difficulty forgiving “being crushed”…but I believe with all of my heart that when we forgive a person or situation, it is not us, but God who actually does the forgiving… for and through us. the fragrance of God on the situation, I love it.

There have been many times there is something so big and insane there is no way I… can handle it much less allow it & I cannot let go & I cant do it by myself, I just cant! Then somehow through meditation/prayer/grace.. I feel that Jesus/God is looking at the situation, saying “Here, give it to me, I will do it for you. Didnt you read about what happened to me and how I handled things? – on the cross I prayed and asked my Father “Father Forgive them,..”… It may just be me, but that is when I relax a little and start feeling His “groove” not mine.

Peace
Keren

This is love: to fly toward a secret sky

I dreamed there was a back-up of cars on the entry lane infront of me, I wanted to just get in line, but this is when my car took control and began to fly...

From Rumi: This is love: to fly toward a secret sky, to cause a hundred veils to fall each moment. First to let go of life. Finally, to take a step without feet.
JalaAd-in Rumi (for those who dont know, 12th Century Muslim - a Sufi mystic

I can hear My Father now

"be magnanimous"

Rainbows from God are Promises

I never say I would quit
I just said I wanted to some of the time.

May our anticipation of “Beauty” still to be born to us not die.

May our noblest inspirations of what makes life “Good”
inside our hearts and souls and minds,
remain fresh…virgin…chaste and yearning.

May our highest expectation of perfect “Love” that drives our beings, and from which our hearts are defined,
remain unbound…unconsummated, unfinished and waiting.

May our anticipation of “Beauty” still to be born to us not die.

May the“Possibility”, that is part and parcel of our existence and that of our universe in kind, remain our earthly truth…as well as our infinite reality.

By the Source of All Created things, who Is as Is … uncreated.
Amen

faintly on the breeze

"for many years i told people that God loved them. now instead, i love them myself, and i hear the name of Jesus faintly on the breeze."
Jim Palmer

The Substance of Love

The hardest substance on earth is Love.
It comes on strong, takes home in your soul.
Imposing on your heart, it inflicts the brightest of lights and the darkest of despairs.
Immutable, impervious, rigid and fixed
Once there - always there
yet sometimes not even noticed at all.

Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle

This principle has always appealed to me on a spiritual level, even though it is of course based on quantum (sub-atomic) physics.
In layman terms, it states that the very act of observing/watching/measuring something changes it, so its position/attributes cannot be described or ever determined with 100% accuracy.

Crude comparison for now, but in day-to-day terms, for example, when someone is standing behind me, watching me when I am typing, I freeze and can barely remember the keyboard placements.

Could it be the very act of trying to observe/measure our own concept of God/Love changes it? To me it seems once one insight is revealed and understood, immediately something comes along to challenge it, so it grows or shuts off, or deepens or shrinks… changes, morphs in to something else.

When God/Love measures and probes our heart, we are changed....when we feel it and respond to it.

Too, this principle may also indicate our inability to “judge” anything without touching some aspect of it - whether negative or positive – even if we have a camera on it or have it under a microscope 24 hours a day, 7 days a week..

Peace
Keren

Overly Dramatic Cactus

Saint Anthony - The Finder

Today (June 13) is the Feast Day of Saint Anthony of Padua (1195-1231) a Franciscan, and a Miracle Worker.

Born to a wealthy family, he declined the life of a nobleman and entered the Augustinian Abbey of St. Vincent – a scholarly order. He immersed himself in study of scripture; the writings of the Holy Fathers; and in prayer.

At one point he met *five Franciscan brothers who were traveling to preach to Muslims in Morocco. He later learned that they were martyred. Hearing the call to give away more of himself to follow Christ, he decided to join the Franciscan order, received approval from his superiors, and joined the Fransicans.

Once, he was he was chosen to give a homily when no one else was available. He was told to just let the Holy Spirit speak for him. He was nervous but the words sprang off his tongue, capturing the hearts and attention of everyone there.

Saint Francis of Assisi himself wrote Saint Anthony and asked him to be in charge of teaching theology to the brothers, who would then go out and preach the gospel to the world. However, he is now better known as an orator, rather than teacher. He spoke loud and clear and in a manner understandable by all people: the poor and the rich, the young and the old, the dull and the wise.

He spoke against heresy and moral duplicity. One time he preached for several days to a group of religious leaders and was welcomed on the last day by an empty room. Undeterred he went down to the seashore, where the river met the sea, and preached his faith to the fish - thousands of fish appeared to listen.

He had great compassion for the poor and oppressed, and many miracles are attributed to him. A few days before Saint Anthony’s death he saw and felt himself holding the baby Jesus. Someone looking through the window at the time indeed saw him with a baby.

Saint Anthony is best known as the Patron Saint of Lost Articles.

Saint Anthony’s life and ministry teach us how to be “Finders”:

- to carry our Faith the way we would hold a baby - firmly but with gentle fingers

- to listen for the call to follow Jesus and always be open for another yet deeper call

- to ask the Holy Spirit to illuminate us through prayer; in studying the Holy Scripture; and in studying the lives of Holy People

- to look for the simple truth in every situation, and

- to seek to taste the simple truth from our own tongue.

Saint Anthony was canonized less than one year after his death. He was made a Doctor of the Church in 1946 by Pope Pius XII.


(* note) The five Franciscan brothers martyred in Morocco were canonized by Sixtus IV in 1481: Saints Berardo, Pietro, Accursio, Adiuto and Ottone.

Revamping My Blogs

http://kerensgallery.wordpress.com/

Website www.kerensgallery.com

Im in process of updating my web sites.

More later
K