I Will Let Love Rule Today

Posted on January 31, 2014 by Douglas

This is the second in a series of three posts regarding the Step 70 review of Steps to Knowledge. In this review, three weeks worth of practice, from Step 50 to Step 69. The first post in the series covered the Step 70 review of Steps 50 through 55. Step 56 was a review. This post will examine my Step 70 review of Steps 57 through 62, with some commentary.

I will let love rule today

Step 57 – “Freedom is with me today” – “I was not very good on hourly practice in this or any of the steps before Step 70 requiring hourly practice.” In my Step 63 review of this Step, I wrote “Freedom is doing what I know, being my True Self. Slavery is to follow my surface thoughts, the surface thoughts of others.” Between then and now, I’ve gotten more consistent at hourly practice by using my cell phone as an hourly alarm.

Step 58 – “Knowledge is with me” – “It is encouraging to even contemplate the possibility that Knowledge knows I’m approaching it, and likes it.” In my Step 63 review of this Step, I wrote “Knowledge desires to enfold my little self in itself. Someone on the inside has heard about it. My little efforts of my little part has caught the attention of Knowledge, my True Self, the God Seed within me. That is a comforting and encouraging thought.” The line “Someone on the inside has heard about it” comes from Minnesota poet Robert Bly, describing the experience of someone starting on a spiritual path.

Step 59 – “Today I will learn patience” – “Observe me without judgment. Observe the world without judgment. Repeat until eternity.” In my Step 63 review of this Step, I wrote “I am so impatient! I want half of America to change its beliefs right now! I damn myself for not going straight toward Knowledge right now! Time and time again I am told to observe without judgment.” I was much more politically opinionated when I did this Step than I am now. Is this a good thing? Maybe. I know I am suffering less about the things politicians say and do. Am I being more patient with politicians? Maybe.

Step 60 – “I will not judge the world today” – “See above. [the commentary on the previous step]” In my Step 63 review of this Step, I wrote “My standard m. o. [modus operandi, way of doing things when left to my own devices] is to judge, judge, judge. When I think that this is the world I have come to serve, I hear the voice of Timon in The Lion King saying ‘Whoa! Talk about your fixer upper!’ Every so often I hear ‘America is in need of the New Message’ not judging America as it plunges toward ruin.”

Step 61 – “Love gives of itself through me” – “Not judging is letting love rule, express itself.” I’m not a big Lenny Kravitz fan, but this song got me. If I don’t judge today, I will let love rule today.

Step 62 – “Today I will learn to listen to life” – “Being present is not judging is letting love rule.” If I am present with others, I will let love rule today.

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.

A Time of Vigilance

Posted on January 31, 2014 by Alisa

A Time of Vigilance

For me the Messenger’s Vigil 2014 was a time of vigilance, a time for coming to a deeper awareness and understanding of what this Message, the New Message from God, means for the world as a whole and to me in particular. A time of vigilance is a time for being alert and watchful for signs and signals that might be significant. I believe a lot of signals were given during this Vigil, I hope I was vigilant enough to catch them.
This was my first time to attend a New Message Vigil live. This year, I was vigilant enough to realize that the time of the evening broadcasts in Boulder, Colorado coincided nicely with the time I am usually up and about in the morning on the other side of the world in Moscow, Russia. I am an early riser and awoke naturally at just the right time each morning to be seated at my computer, my hands cupped warmly around a mug of fragrant coffee, in time for the start of each broadcast.

Here I would like to write briefly about each broadcast of the seven-day Vigil and highlight what spoke to me most clearly.

Day One: January 22 – The Life of the Messenger hosted by Reed and Patricia, with a brief appearance by Marshall

“The seven day Messenger Vigil commemorates the man sent into the world to receive The New Message from God. Across a long journey of many decades, Marshall Vian Summers has brought to us a revelation of vast scope, the largest body of revelation ever to be received in recorded history — over 9000 pages of divine wisdom, prophecy and a new spiritual practice to guide humanity into the next chapter of evolution and emergence.

“Like peering into the multi-faceted heart of a diamond, these sacred days are given to us to penetrate the mystery of our relationship with this man, the first Greater Community Messenger sent to Earth.”

This first broadcast was indeed like peering into the multi-faceted heart of a diamond for me. I am only just beginning to penetrate the mystery of my relationship with the Messenger. If I am to be totally honest with myself and with you, I will say that I do not really know who he is. Something deep within me responds when I see him talk, but it is from a place beyond my surface mind that I do not fully understand. Every time I see him talk though, there are words that reach me and leave a deep impression on me.

This time, Marshall spoke for around 6 minutes of the total hour and 15 minutes, appearing at around 1:02.20 into the broadcast and speaking until 1:08.11, but for me those six minutes were packed with the most profound words, full of signs and signals. Here are a few of the moments that sang to me.

I bring to you the mystery of your life.

The mystery of my life is what is most precious to me, and Marshall is bringing it to me.

I ask you to be what you really are—not pathetic, not self-demeaning, not weak, not prone to domination or manipulation, but to be what and who you really are.

For someone prone to this kind of petty deprecation, I rise to the challenge of being who I really am, remembering who I really am.

Your heart will be glad that you have finally found what you need and what you are looking for.

My heart is truly glad for I indeed feel that I have found what I need and what I have been looking for all my life.

To trust me is to trust what is true within you.

This spoke to me so profoundly, I recognize its truth.

Day 2: January 23 – The Origin and Lineage of the Messenger hosted by Ana and Ellen

A celebration, honor and reverence of the mystery and reality of the Messenger’s origins… his lineage, his qualities, his mission, his future and destiny…

Ana asked an important question for me at the beginning of the broadcast, saying, if the emphasis so far has been on the Message and not the Messenger, why the Vigil? If it is the Message that is important, why stop and focus for these seven days on the Messenger? She suggested we feel this question out within ourselves, asking ourselves whether all this attention on the Messenger brings up discomfort?

I asked myself these questions and this is what I came up with.

I cannot claim to feel any discomfort, incredulity maybe, yes. Incredulity because it is beyond my current realm of understanding that there is a person on earth sent by the Angelic Assembly that watches over our world to bring us a New Revelation from God. His presence is inexpliable. I am willing to accept inexplicable things.

Day 3: January 24 – The Story of the Messenger hosted by Reed and Will

Marshall Vian Summers, like the Messengers before him, is a symbol of the emergence of Knowledge within the individual.

In his 64 years in manifest life, he discovered the greater Knowledge he carried within himself and with it the memory of those who sent him and the mission for which he had so long been prepared.

This broadcast helped to shed some light on the Messenger’s past, his life to date, as shared so entertainingly by his son, Reed, and Will, who has been close to the Messenger since the age of 16. I found more interesting information in this text called The Messenger.

One of the highlights was being shown the contents of Marshall’s bag that he carried around with him all the time on the mountain during his initiation as a tool for engaging with the Source. It is a sacred item for him personally, one that helped him make the connection, to entrain so powerfully, as Reed put it.

Day 4: January 25 – The Qualities and Requirements of God’s Messenger hosted by Ayesha and Tyyne

Just as divine revelation has always occurred, Marshall is receiving a gift from God to be given to the world. This is no easy task. Courage, forbearance, stability and humility this has required of him.

Ayesha and Tyyne read some phrases about the qualities and requirements of the Messenger, saying that he passed the test for these requirements. They included fidelity, trustworthiness, restraint, patience, trust, the ability to see errors without condemnation, the ability to be able to wait, to be intelligent but yielding, strong emotionally, dependable, reliable, have discernment, discretion, stability, and be a pillar of strength. I think it is worth pursuing a relationship with somehow who expresses these qualities. They are qualities I wish to emulate.

Day 5: January 26 – The Mission and the Burden of the Messenger hosted by Robert and Jeanine

Marshall Vian Summers is part of a Greater Order. He is the expression of a greater Plan to unite the divided peoples of our world and advance the reclamation of the separated through Knowledge.

This seems like one mighty mission, a burden too great for one man.

Perseverance is another quality of the Messenger. But does perseverance help to lift the burden? From the videos of late I sense the great toll being the Messenger is having on Marshall’s health. It seems to weigh down on him. I feel that one of the purposes of this Vigil, one of the reasons for shifting the emphasis to the Messenger, was a call for help.

Day 6: January 27 – The Future and Destiny of the Messenger hosted by Carol and Darlene

The emergence of Knowledge is possible for each of us. It represents our greater destiny and our higher purpose in life. The Messenger will again, one day, rejoin the Unseen Ones. Yet while he is in the world with us now we can know him and we can join him in support of his divine mission.

This was a day of fulfilled expectations and complete surprises. My expectation of seeing Darlene host one of the broadcasts was fulfilled, but it came as a complete surprise when my birthday letter to Marshall was read out on the air as a testimony. It was beautifully and gently read by a beautiful and gentle woman who said she would like to meet me in person. I feel I would like to meet her too. At the time, I felt abashed, but in hindsight, I think I might call it serendipitous.

Day 7: January 28 – The Assembly Celebration of the Birth of The Messenger, His Presence in the World and His Mission to Serve the Earth hosted by Reed and Patricia with an appearance by Marshall

“The Assembly watches and waits for those who can respond to the Message that God is sending into the world at this moment, for the Messenger is now coming forth to speak, to proclaim and to teach the Revelation. He has been withheld for a long time until the Message was complete. Now it is complete, and the world is in great need of it, greater than you can realize at this moment.Heaven watches and waits to see who can receive, who can recognize, who can take the Steps to Knowledge and receive the gift of a greater life.” ~ The Assembly

I was pleased to see Marshall looking revitalized and energized as he spoke on his birthday. He talked of recognition being only the first step, it is not yet relationship. Recognition is acknowledgment of what is true in another person, but relationship is based on what people can do together. For me this means, taking action, walking the talk.

Another thing I noticed was that all the women of the Society who hosted the daily broadcasts and those that spoke and gave their testimonies are so youthful, with radiant glowing skin, Patricia being the epitome of this during this last broadcast on Marshall’s birthday. This is also something I want and wish to emulate.

A time of vigilance it was indeed. Not only was I alert and watchful, able to catch signs and signals, I felt that something inexplicably meaningful happened. I felt raised to a new level of vibration and awareness, so grateful and comforted to have found these people who are spearheading evolution of our planet and wanting to be a part.

I also share Douglas’s feelings about the Vigil, it too gave me happy feelings of encouragement and strengthening, a feeling of community with other New Message people around the world, with the Society members in Boulder, and with Marshall Vian Summers himself.

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Messenger’s Vigil 2014

Posted on January 30, 2014 by Douglas

I have mentioned in this space that one of the annual events of the New Message from God community is a thing called the Messenger’s Vigil. This event took place this year from Wednesday, January 21 to Tuesday, January 28. The event was a series of hour-or-so-long webcasts. These webcasts had some reading from the teachings of Marshall Vian Summers, some testimonies from students of the New Message from God, and occasional brief messages from Marshall himself.

Messenger’s Vigil 2014

I watched five of these webcasts, missing the ones on Saturday, January 24, and Sunday, January 25. The videos are available at YouTube. Here is my experience.

There is a lot of recent New Message material regarding the nature and life of its Messenger. Part of the Messenger’s Vigil for me is hearing and reflecting on this material. This is the portion of the New Message from God that I am having a little difficulty assimilating. I am working on understanding why certain aspects of it are necessary for me to know. But the New Message from God has earned a great deal of trust with me over the time of my engagement with it. Therefore, I go forward.

Monday’s webcast had a personal note as someone read Alisa’s testimony of her engagement with the New Message, (starting at 52:30). In July of 2013, inviting Alisa to blog at Ascending Knowledge seemed like just another thing I was supposed to do, On further review, it seems to be a much bigger deal than I originally contemplated, with the force of friendship extending its mysterious power in unexpected directions.

On Tuesday’s concluding webcast, a never-before-released teaching of Marshall Vian Summers, called “The Assembly” was played. I thought I heard it say, among other things that the New Message is complete. Could that be? And what could that mean? I don’t know right now.

Marshall Vian Summers concluded his brief remarks to the audience in the first webcast with “I need you. Now.” He was speaking of the task of bringing the New Message from God into a world of contention. It might take a while. It could be tricky.

I have a happy feeling of encouragement and strengthening from having attended the Messenger’s Vigil. It takes a little tolerance for being out of the ordinary to be a student of Steps to Knowledge, but being with other students draws something good out of me that might not have been drawn out of me otherwise.

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Внутреннее слушание

Posted on January 28, 2014 by Alisa

For English version click here.

Внутреннее слушание

Внутреннее слушание казалось бы не из самых легких задач. Внутреннее слушание требует особого внимания. А Шаг 15 в книге «Шаги к Знанию» призывает именно к этому роду занятия. Он начинает с заявлением: «Сегодня я буду слушать свой опыт, чтобы узнать содержание моего ума». Да уж! И как, позвольте спросить, я должна это сделать?

Последнее предложение дает мне подсказку: «Ты прислушиваешься к чему-то глубже, чем твой ум, но чтобы добраться до него, надо пройти через ум».

«Все страньше и страньше!» подумала я про себя. Да именно так придется делать, как Алиса в Стране Чудес – она провалилась сквозь землю и оказалась в совсем другом мире, где всё не так, как оказывается при первом взгляде, где всё даже очень любопытно.

Я решила, что “пройти через ум” потребует каких-то специальных усилий.

Я попробовала, и написала в своих записях следующее:

“Я не уверена, что делаю это правильно, но вот то, что произошло, когда я сделала этот шаг сегодня.

“Я представила, как будто я отправилась в космос, вне границ Земли через звездные пространства, пока я не оказалась в темном, темном месте, столь темном и плотном, что я думала, что не смогу выдержать, я задохнусь. Но я позволила себе погрузиться в это пространство, почувствовать его плотность, всю его темноту, как сажа или черный бархат, плотный и непроницаемый, принимать его и даже была готова остаться там, если понадобилось. Потом я увидела в каком-то расстоянии немного тусклого света, как будто дверь приоткрывается, сначала свет был очень слабым, но становился всё ярче, прорываясь через темноту сияющими лучами. Я двигалась в его сторону, шагала сквозь него, и оказалась в великолепном, сказочно красивом месте, таким знакомым, ярким, прозрачным, светлым. И я знала, что буду всегда возвращаться сюда.”
Это и есть то самое внутреннее слушание? Внутреннее слушание, которое позволит мне знать содержание моего ума? Я не знаю. Но знаю одно – когда я этим занималась, я почувствовала, что это верно, мне было комфортно и хорошо.

Сегодня я понимаю внутреннее слушание, как глубокое ощущение уверенности в правильности своего пути. Когда я слушаю без суждения, без оценки, без критики, и без завышенных ожиданий, то я действительно могу узнать себя истинного и содержание своего ума.

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I Will Accept My Non-Acceptance As It Is

Posted on January 26, 2014 by Douglas

Step 70 of Steps to Knowledge is a review, but not a review of the past seven steps, as Step 56 and Step 63 are. Step 70 is a review of the past three weeks worth of practice. Step 70 is a review of Steps 50 through 69. One could call it “the little big review,” as Step 49, a review of Steps 1 through 48, is “the big review.” Steps 1 through 7 are reviewed a total of three times (Step 7, Step 14, Step 49). Steps 8 through 48 are reviewed two times (once in the weekly review, and once in Step 49). Steps 50 through 62 are reviewed two times (once in the weekly review, and once in Step 70). Steps 64 through 69 are reviewed once, in Step 70. This is the first of a series of three posts on the Step 70 review.

Step 70 is one of three steps (49, 70, and 140) which use the word “Congratulations!” I’m not exactly sure why congratulations are in order, but anyone who has reached this point realizes that Steps to Knowledge means what it says. Therefore, I will accept the idea that a certain accomplishment has taken place.

I wrote more about my experience in the Step 56 and Step 63 reviews than I did in the Step 70 review. But I believe it might still be useful to share what I wrote with a little bit of commentary.

I will accept my non-acceptance as it is

Step 50 – Today I will be with Knowledge – “I seem to recall that I did the practice, but I have no memory of any particular experience.”

Step 51 – Let me recognize my fears so that I may see the truth beyond them – “There is truth beyond my fear that I’m going to **** it all up, fail to reclaim Knowledge.” In the Step 56 review I wrote “I recall the Bible verse about how the devil, through the fear of death, keeps people in lifelong bondage. Fear reduces to the fear of death, when the chain is followed long enough. I considered the truth behind a laundry list of fears.” I am pleased with myself that I wrote a number of posts about this Step.

Step 52 – I am free to find the source of my Knowledge – “I am free to receive God.” In the Step 56 review I wrote “I didn’t get this Step. God is the source of my Knowledge. Does this step mean I’m free to find God today? I took a vacation of a couple of months before completing this step in the midst of my bewilderment.” On further review, I consider that an error. Don’t do that.

Step 53 – My gifts are for others – “I am mystified by my gifts. I don’t even know what my gifts are. Child said my autism is a gift.” In the Step 56 review I wrote “This Step was not controversial to me. I have had a lifelong desire to contribute, but it has been thwarted, mocked, stomped on till it don’t move no more.”

Step 54 – I will not live in idealism – “I have an ideal to be normal. I have an ideal to be useful.” I wrote in the Step 56 review, “I only have 70 trillion ideals, be a super-missionary, end world hunger, enlighten the planet, etc.” Between the time I did this step and now, I have given up on the ideal of being normal. I would like to fulfill my mission in life, though.

Step 55 – I will accept the world as it is – “So this is the world I came to serve. Talk about your fixer upper.” In the Step 56, review, I wrote “I accept that I don’t want to accept the world as it is, not even a little bit.” Acceptance has to start somewhere.

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Listening To My Experience

Posted on January 24, 2014 by Alisa

Listening to my experience is not an activity I normally engage in on any given day. In fact, I am hard pressed to know precisely what this means and what is expected of me.

Step 15. I Shall Listen To My Experience Today begins with an affirmation: “Today I will listen to my experience to find out the content of my mind.”

Hmmm, a tall order, you may be thinking. And I did too. Even as a student of Knowledge, I have little to go on so far. I was told in the previous step, the Step 14 Review, that “Throughout your study plan, you will be investigating the content of your own experience.”

Alright, but please show me how, I hear myself saying.

I am given some clue in the last sentence of the Step: “You are listening for something deeper than the mind, but you must go through the mind to get there.”

I took this to mean I needed to engage in some serious meditation. However, I cannot say that meditation comes easy to me, especially when it entails “going through the mind.”

I did make some attempt, however, which my notes testify to. They say:

I am not sure I am doing this right, but this is what happened when I did this step today.

It was as though I travelled out into space beyond the confines of Earth, through the starry expanses until I found myself in a dark, dark place, so dark and dense that I thought I would be unable to stand it, I would suffocate. But I let myself sink into this space, feel its denseness, feel its pitch blackness, like soot or black velvet, dense and impenetrable, accept it and even be prepared to stay there if that’s what was meant to be.

Then in the distance I saw a crack of light, a door slightly open, first very faint, but then the light becoming stronger, breaking through the dark with ever brilliant rays, until I stepped through it, blinded at first, but then finding myself in a beautiful landscape. A landscape so familiar, so luminous and fresh. And I knew I would always return to this place.

Listening to my experience

Does this pass for listening to my experience to find out the content of my mind? I do not know. All I know is it felt true at the time, it felt familiar and comforting. It enabled me to see things and know things I might not have otherwise seen or known.

There are more pointers on this practice of inner listening here.

Listening to my experience and the very act of listening as such are open to a variety of interpretations. I find what Ronald Barthes, a linguist and philosopher, had to say about listening illuminating. He claimed that listening can be understood on three levels: alerting, deciphering, and understanding, whereby the third level requires turning off your judgment while listening.

I smile since this is precisely what Step 15 calls for: “you must listen without judgment to allow your mind to open.”

Today I understand listening to my experience to mean feeling and trusting what I know to be true.

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American Prophet

Posted on January 22, 2014 by Douglas

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You build tombs for the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous. And you say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our ancestors, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ So you testify against yourselves that you are the descendants of those who murdered the prophets. Go ahead, then, and complete what your ancestors started!” (Matthew 23:29-32, New International Version)

It is as if building tombs for the prophets and decorating the graves of the righteous was their way of anesthetizing themselves from the truth that killing the prophets was in their nature, part of their spiritual DNA.

American Prophet

Many people say “Well, if the prophet were here, he would surely advocate my cause!” I ask them “Would you stake your life, your fortune and your sacred honor on that claim?”

Politicians prefer prophets in another place, or another period.

The people often hold great thoughts in their deepest hearts. And sometimes only blunderingly express them, haltingly and stumblingly say them, and faultily put them into practice.

Preachers make pulpits famous. Prophets make prisons famous.

“You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell? Therefore I am sending you prophets and sages and teachers. Some of them you will kill and crucify; others you will flog in your synagogues and pursue from town to town. And so upon you will come all the righteous blood that has been shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Berekiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. Truly I tell you, all this will come on this generation.” (Matthew 23:33-36, New International Version)

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Practicing Stillness

Posted on January 21, 2014 by Douglas

Between Step 8, “Today I will be still,” and Step 69, “Today I will practice stillness,” Steps to Knowledge directs students to practice stillness on 13 separate occasions. My mind has a hunger to know, “Am I doing it right?” Did I pick the correct internal point on which to concentrate? Am I using the breath in the correct way? How do I know if I’m doing it right? What am I supposed to experience? But all these questions contain words or phrases related to judgment, such as “right,” “correct” and “supposed to.”

Practicing stillness

I believe that for many students, the experiences of these 13 different occasions of practicing stillness will vary greatly. I think that is a good thing. If students are observing their practice, they will notice when they were more devoted and when they were more ambivalent. That’s a good subject for investigation. Some stillness practices might have been disrupted by the physical environment. Sometimes the mind is particularly insistent about something. Sometimes a number of things came together, and a small vacation is successfully taken from one’s mind and its concerns. Getting from Step 8 to Step 69 involves discovering that stillness takes away a great deal of suffering and drama, and is thus a worthy enterprise. Getting from Step 8 to Step 69 includes collecting data on what helps stillness and what hinders stillness.

Someone is reading this and thinking, “Well, what’s your stillness practice, Mr. Student-of-Steps-to-Knowledge?” I’m happy to tell you, but I make no claim that it will work for you.

I sit on a comfortable couch. If I am practicing stillness at night, I keep the room dimly lit with indirect light from outside the room.

I program the session by mentally saying once at the beginning of the practice period, “With each breath, I become more still, for I am worthy of stillness.” When my mind insists that I think about something, I mentally say “I will consider this later, but for now I will be still, for I am worthy of stillness.” This is using the idea from Step 32, “The truth is with me. I can feel it” of taking a small vacation from one’s mind. I imagine these thoughts floating up to the surface of my mind, as I sink further down toward the depths.

I steal a couple of pages from the playbook of A Course in Miracles. Somewhere around Lesson 50, there are a number of Lessons where the practice is to “find the light within you.” Another direction is to “sink back within the mind,” as if I am headed for the depth of the mind where things are known. Therefore, what I consider to be stillness appears as an inner brightness to me. As I become more still, I regularly see my body in my mind’s eye, stretched out straight, my arms pointed to my left and right, rotating in all three dimensions, as if I was attempting a fancy 10-meter platform dive down to the depths of my mind. I don’t understand why this is the case, but there it is.

I believe the fruit of a stillness session is being a little less unhappy about whatever I was most unhappy about the most before the stillness session. I believe the fruit of a stillness session is being a little bit more open to different solutions to the problems I face. Practicing stillness is a good way for me to become a little calmer and more rapidly adaptive in life.

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Envisioning A Brighter Future

Posted on January 17, 2014 by Alisa

When envisioning a brighter future, I envision more and more people waking up and embracing the concepts offered in the New Message. I specifically envision more and more people opening up to the greater intelligence that resides within each person.

The current January-February session of the Free School of the New Message from God offers an opportunity to explore a revelation titled The New World and what this means for us today. This revelation of the New World can be very sobering and even shocking, for in essence it is a wakeup call to take action before it is too late. And we have been heading for disaster for quite some time, only people do not want to take heed. Too many people still think they can go on using and abusing nature, spoiling and polluting the environment, taking more than they return, without it having any dire consequences. And physical demise of the planet is only one aspect. The mental, emotional, and spiritual impoverishment of humankind is also glaringly obvious.

However, I am an incurable optimist. I have undying faith in the human race and its ability to pull up its socks and get with it.

I mean, who wouldn’t want to do what it says here in this excerpt from The New World?

It is this time which can be so redeeming, so clarifying, so sobering, bringing people into the present where they can seek more simple pleasures, more natural activities, become more present to one another, more available to one another, more comprehending of what they see around them. It is within this that certain individuals will begin to reclaim a greater intelligence that resides within each person, an intelligence which we call Knowledge, a greater mind unspoiled by the world, unafraid of the world.

Envisioning a brighter future

In envisioning a brighter future, I take great comfort when I come across something like this. I highly recommend listening to all this boy has to say.

If more of our children had this vision and intelligence, my mind would rest at ease, a brighter future for our planet is guaranteed.

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Let’s Use “Ethnic” Instead Of “Racial,” Shall We?

Posted on January 16, 2014 by Douglas

I’ve been told that if I confess my errors to other people, and pray for other people, then I will be healed. I’m feeling a desire to confess an error of my country, and to request your prayers and good intentions for its progress.

Condoleezza Rice called the institution of slavery “America’s birth defect.” Even after slavery was ended by the Civil War of 1861-1865, a system of institutional second-class citizenship for the slaves and their descendants emerged in America. It took another hundred years for that system to be confronted and dismantled by the work of many individuals, most notably Martin Luther King, Jr. One aspect of this system were laws banning marriage between citizens of certain ethnicities.

I am pleased to report that my home state of Minnesota never had such a law. I am also told that in Minnesota’s past, a marriage between a person of Swedish ancestry and a person of Norwegian ancestry was considered a scandalous mixed marriage.

All state laws banning marriage between citizens of different ethnicities were declared unConstitutional by the Supreme Court in the case Loving v. Virginia in 1967. Since then, the number of marriages described by the term “interracial marriages” has consistently increased. I consider this a wholesome trend. There are others who, for whatever reason, do not. Tamera Mowry comments here on those who have bitterly criticized her interracial marriage:

Let’s use “ethnic” instead of racial, shall we?

I hereby declare my desire for the words “race,” “racial,” etc. to only be used in the context of the entire human species, the entire human family. The way the word “race” is currently used is a historical artifact of a more ignorant time. People once believed that other people of certain different ethnicities, were actually members of different species. This has been demonstrated and documented as a false belief. The words “ethnic” and “ethnicity” come from the Greek word which is translated in the New Testament as “nations,” “Gentiles” or “peoples.” Ethnicity is a perfectly good word to describe what people mistakenly use the word race to describe. Therefore, I consider Tamera Mowry’s marriage to Adam Housley to be an “interethnic marriage.”

Someone is reading this and thinking “Douglas, what you are proposing will never happen.” I realize this might take a while. The word “miscegenation” was once commonly used to describe certain interethnic marriages, but has dropped out of public discourse. I’m putting in my request for the change I want to see in the world.

Someone is reading this and thinking “But Douglas, by the definition you have just proposed, there are vast numbers of interethnic marriages. It takes the drama out of the whole deal.” Truth has a way of doing that, doesn’t it?

Someone else is reading this and thinking “But Douglas, what about the haters?” Just as some people have a certain attachment to their country, other people have a certain attachment to their ethnicity. Some people have undue ethnic pride, others have undue ethnic self-loathing. But in the unified world I dream of and work toward, ethnic prejudice is a long-renounced insanity, as unacceptable as, say, not wearing clothes in public is today. I invite the people who disapprove of the marriage of Tamara Mowry and Adam Housley to have a conversation in the secret chamber of their hearts, examining the ethnic attachment which is the root of all ethnic prejudice.

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Mystery of Ascension

A great mystery / Is my true self that I bring / From my ancient home

Monthly Archives: January 2014

I Will Let Love Rule Today