Thoughts: Aldo gets it. Open your heart to your community…
Thoughts: Don’t forget your flashlight….
“The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek. Fear of the unknown is our greatest fear. Many of us would enter a tiger’s lair before we would enter a dark cave. While caution is a useful instinct, we lose many opportunities and much of the adventure of life if we fail to support the curious explorer within us.”
~Joseph Campbell
Writings: Remembering Galway, flowering again, from within
One of my favourite poets (and yours), Galway Kinnell, passed away last week. It was great to hear what Liz Rosenberg, writing in the Boston Globe, said: “Kinnell is a poet of the rarest ability, the kind who comes once or twice in a generation, who can flesh out music, raise the spirits and break the heart.”
Here’s a little tip of the hat to him, with this posting of his poem, St. Francis & the Sow:
St. Francis & the Sow
The bud
stands for all things,
even for those things that don’t flower,
for everything flowers, from within, of self-blessing;
though sometimes it is necessary
to reteach a thing its loveliness,
to put a hand on its brow
of the flower
and retell it in words and in touch
it is lovely
until it flowers again from within, of self-blessing;
as Saint Francis
put his hand on the creased forehead
of the sow, and told her in words and in touch
blessings of earth on the sow, and the sow
began remembering all down her thick length,
from the earthen snout all the way
through the fodder and slops to the spiritual curl of the tail,
from the hard spininess spiked out from the spine
down through the great broken heart
to the sheer blue milken dreaminess spurting and shuddering
from the fourteen teats into the fourteen mouths sucking and blowing beneath them:
the long, perfect loveliness of sow.
Writings: Reporting in from the Magic Kingdom, the real one…
Most of you know that the World According to Brother Ian features visionaries, prophets, wise women & some smart guys, and truth-tellers, with the hope that their words uplift (at least) and guide us in our efforts (even better) to create a better world.
(THAT’S what you do? Oh. – Reader response.)
In the spirit of this, it’s cool to come closer to home. My brother Pat‘s latest essay moved me enough to add it to your daily reading, here. He has a gift for sharing how nature matters, as you can see here.
He’s a lifelong environmental activist who gets things done, from Birmingham, Alabama. This has been re-printed in newspapers and magazines from Chicago to Albany to Seattle to Victoria, BC…bet you like this one:
“When are you going to take your family to Disney World?” Every fall, my cousin and I watch football games in his “man cave” that’s equipped with sports memorabilia, Xbox, a fully stocked bar and the crown jewel, an HD 70-inch television. As a lifelong southerner who loves college football, this is nirvana.
And for about five or six years, my cousin pops the Disney question.
You see, I have a 10-year-old daughter who’s never been to Disney World.
The window is closing fast.
A year or two ago, American Girl dolls traveled with us everywhere. Planning for a trip to the grandparents in Chattanooga was like organizing a busload of tourists. In our case, dolls and stuffed animals.
These days, fewer and fewer American Girls dolls are joining us, and my cousin, who has an older daughter, has warned me that the Disney-princesses are not going to be as appealing come this fall and spring.
I have nothing against Disney World or princesses, but this past summer my family decided to do something different. We celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Wilderness Act by visiting the Citico Creek Wilderness area in the Cherokee National Forest, near Tellico Plains, Tennessee.
We traded castles and mouse ears for waterfalls, salamanders and darters.
We hiked into the Citico Wilderness, ending up at Falls Branch Falls, a spectacular roaring 70-foot waterfall. Nurse logs, moss, mushrooms and wildflowers abound. We also snorkeled in the wilderness-fed Citico Creek, donning wetsuits, floating and exploring for hours in a rushing 3-foot clean and clear stream. I will never forget the moment my daughter grabbed my hand when she saw her first colorful darter – a moment of joy and discovery we would experience a hundred times that morning and afternoon.
For my entire family, the wilderness became our Magic Kingdom.
Disney World in Florida and the Wilderness Act are about the same age. The Wilderness Act passed in 1964; after several years of development. Disney World opened in 1971.
Both are uniquely American.
We all know the story of Disney, but many of us do not know America’s wilderness story.
Fifty years ago this year, Congress passed and President Lyndon Johnson signed into law The Wilderness Act of 1964. The act established the National Wilderness Preservation System and allowed Congress to permanently protect some of America’s most special and beautiful places as wilderness.
Today, there are 757 distinct wilderness areas located in 44 states and Puerto Rico, designated to preserve and protect wildlife and natural systems for hiking, camping, backpacking, picnicking, rock-climbing, hunting, fishing, kayaking and nature photography. These special places provide us clean air to breathe and clean water to drink.
Big Frog and Little Frog, Linville Gorge, Shining Rock, Cohutta, Sipsey and Shenandoah — these are the special names of just a few of our southern wildernesses.
And there is one key difference between Disney World and these wilderness areas. Disney is owned by shareholders and is a multinational corporation. We—all Americans—own the wilderness areas.
It’s all public land. It’s our treasure, our inheritance. We all have a stake in it. We are responsible for it, and future generations are counting on us to pass it down protected and preserved.
In the age of Facebook and social media, my cousin has seen pictures posted of my daughter standing beside waterfalls and big trees, in a wetsuit.
He hasn’t mentioned Disney this fall in the “man cave.” But we’ve talked about our Magic Kingdom — America’s wilderness.
In fact, I’ve been saying, “When are you going to take your family to the wilderness?”
——————————————
Pat Byington is executive director of Wild South. He can be reached at pat@wildsouth.org. Learn more about Wild South at http://www.wildsouth.org.
Writings: Doubt, I think…..with Julia Baird
When I was a young monk at a university in Tennessee in the States, I was required to take a class called Religion 101, perhaps because the school trained Anglican/Episcopal priests, perhaps because they saw I’d been to Roman Catholic schools & wanted to straighten me out, or perhaps for the best of reasons: it would be fun.
In class early on, we read things by a Protestant theologian named Paul Tillich, who knocked my cocksure sense of things around by insisting that a key component in the growth of faith was doubt.
Although the stories always include doubt – Peter denying he even knew Jesus, Francis coming back pretty confused from the Crusades, Gandhi’s uncertainties in South Africa, Luther & Calvin & others – it’s always seemed to me that there are many faces of doubt, and many aspects.
I was glad that my friend Father Jon sent me this article from the New York Times by Julia Baird, who is my new favourite writer.
Here’s the article: Doubt as a Sign of Faith
She’s clear, and she says things you & I were thinking already (remember that the Ten Things includes the notion: Truth is self-evident.) I look forward to hearing what you think & feel!
Julia Baird is an author, a journalist and a television presenter with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. She is working on a biography of Queen Victoria. Here’s more about Julia.
Intuitives: Meet Geoff Thompson & the Archangel Collective
When Geoff Thompson made a presentation to the Victoria Metaphysical and Intuitive Development Group (here’s their Meetup page & here’s their Facebook page) back in April, he discussed how things work with him & his connection to the Archangel Collective, then had a session where he channeled them and they answered questions from the overflow crowd (our biggest of the year).
The answers were grounded, easy to understand, and easy to apply. The two comments I heard the most afterwards: Wow, that was really useful!..and…When is he coming back?
Well – this week! (October 10th at 7pm @ the Fernwood Community Centre in Victoria).
Here’s what the Meetup co-hosts Dawn & Sarah tell me:
Join Geoff Thompson (channel for the Archangel Collective) for an open discussion about the changing times we are in and the importance of being brave. Geoff will be channeling the being known as Tobel, member of the Ascended Council of Angels and keeper of the language of light. Sharing insights from both the perspective of the Archangels and that of his many physical incarnations Tobel will discuss what it is like to move through these changing times and why they are so important for us.
There will be a live question and answer period where individuals will be able to pose their questions to Tobel and the Archangel Collective and special details on Discovering Ascension services for those in attendance.
+++++++++++
See you there! Here is Goeff’s website (Discovering Ascension), and here’s a bit about Goeff:
Geoff has been extrasensory his whole life, his ability to feel the emotions of others was almost overwhelming at certain times of his life. It took many years for him to learn how to best channel this ability, but when he did, a brand new world opened up to him. It was with the help of many spiritual teachers that he was finally able to connect with what is known as the Archangel Collective.
The Archangel Collective is a group of benevolent entities whose only wish is to help human beings achieve the highest levels of joy and happiness. They express themselves through unconditional love and complete acceptance of who you are in this moment. While many people are aware of who the Archangels are, either by way of religious teachings or spiritual connection, most are not aware that they try communicating with us constantly. You may be guided by them at any moment and not even know it! They hear your pleas and prayers and try desperately to reach you. The challenge can come in the form of misunderstanding them or identifying too strongly with the Ego.
As an extension of their work, Geoff channels their messages to you directly, so that they can better help you with any situation you may be dealing with. They do not judge, they do not have personal motives. They simply want to be apart of your life in whatever manner you choose. Let Geoff help you connect with your guardian angels and Archangels and experience the overwhelming love that is their presence.
Writing: You first.
Take care of yourself.
People always say that, but there’s a little physics equation mixed in there.
I’m pretty sure you can’t take care of other folks any better than you take care of yourself. And you know it’s true – you see amazing people who take care of amazing numbers of people with amazing numbers of problems, in amazing ways, because they look after themselves well.
The little lesson of this is echoed every time a plane is about to take off, as the flight attendant reviews those air thingies that’ll come down if there’s an emergency. If you’re like me, if you were with your kid, the FIRST thing you would do is strap the oxygen thing on to the kid. Then you slump over for lack of oxygen, and the four year old laughs because they think you’re playing. “Wake up, Papa!”
It’s a key part of the equation, so you’ll have more to give.
– Brother Ian
ENC: Columbus, really
In the Emperor’s New Clothes section of this site, we take a look at things that are generally accepted as fact or conventional wisdom, that are neither (like in the story).
Randall with xkcd.com tells it:
About Columbus
Meanwhile, the Oatmeal (Matthew) put together the best easy-to-read treatise on Columbus, based on Howard Zinn’s work, which dispels the “facts” in favour of realizing he & his men were murderers & thieves & child-rapists.
Read here: http://theoatmeal.com/comics/columbus_day
And no, we don’t need an American holiday in honour of this guy, or a Canadian province named after him (British Columbia.)
About Brother Ian
Over the centuries, Brother Ian has been collecting stories & information & discourses for the purpose of elevating the human condition as needed, dissecting it when necessary, and building the case for hope.
In the spirit of noting that organized crime, organized baseball, organized labour, and organized religion tend to engender controversy & occasional discord, I promise to be neither organized or critical of those who are.