Interfaith Services of the Lowcountry

A Further Discussion of Adult Stages and Rituals…

Now, what I presented could be considered the historical and theological rationale for redesigning worship to include periodic rituals for adult stages of spiritual and religious development.
The larger question for consideration is this: Should we acknowledge certain birthdays or age passages or should we not select times per se and choose to acknowledge whenever a person has an “epiphany” or a special, personal break through or when they decide to make a special spiritual commitment?
As a quick review, psychologists and developmental scholars have expanded the concept of steps and stages far beyond the original Freudian ones. For Freud, all development of the self ended in early adolescence or the latency stage. Adler simply deferred to Freud, while Jung did not acknowledge Freud’s stages, preferring only to work with people after the age of 35- before that, Jung said, people have very little inner depth and therefore very little interest for him!

Probably the best known and most widely quoted author on life-span development was Erik Erikson. His theory of the Eight Stages of man, has become a classic format for the discussion of a person’s social and psychological issues and challenges throughout one’s life span. Erikson’s framework states that everyone has to resolve these eight stages, or the problems they represent will persist throughout one’s life and will over time retard their social and psychological skills and maturity.

For our purposes, since the focus is on adulthood, we will recall the last three stages in his theory:
6) Intimacy vs. Isolation– To be accomplished between ages 20-40

7) Generatively vs. Self Absorption– the task for ages 40-60

Integrity vs. Despair- -the concluding task for ages 60+

Again, this stages are not hard and fast, nor are the unheard of out of sequence or interchangeable by age … as a general rule, these tasks are assigned to these age groups a majority of the time and act a focal or fulcrum points in human development.
How do these issues affect one’s spiritual development? And if they do, how can we, as a spiritual community acknowledge their accomplishment or the transitions from stage to stage in a person’s life?

Another schema that has received a great deal of validation has been James Fowler’s stages of faith development. These six stages of religious understanding more directly relate to one’s religious upbringing, cultural teachings about ethics, justice, and tolerance, and one’s ability or accept or understand conundrums, koans, and holy paradoxes that defy simple reasoning or categorical and linear approaches to solutions and problem resolutions.

Listing….
The Stages of Faith or Spiritual Development
One popular theorist, James Fowler, has enjoyed recognition as someone who has put forth an evolutionary set of stages for personal religious maturity and development. These are the stages he suggests and that many in the West agree as possible for each of us:
1) Stage One- Intuitive/Projective
This is the childhood and infancy stage where whatever is told to them about God, nature, humanity and themselves they accept and are taken into their imagination where it develops uncritically into images, beliefs, loves and fears that can last a lifetime. In this stage of one’s development, the is a basic goodness that can be inspired or discouraged by what parents, teachers, and the church teaches to them.
Stage Two- Mythic/Literal
When the imagination lessens, what replaces it is a need or a desire to know all the stories, myths, legends and especially all the rules for being good vs. being bad. Here is the start of morality, and it centers on fairness, rewards, punishments and retributions. Here the Biblical and legendary stories are taken more literally, and there is much emphasis on how one behaves according to a literal interpretation.
Stage Three- Synthetic/Conventional
With puberty and adolescence comes the capacity to look beyond what your family and neighborhood church teaches. You begin to develop the ability to think for oneself. However, thinking for and about one’s self is inadequate. There has to be an ability to think systematically- that is, how the over-all thought and outcome of thoughts and actions resolves itself and how larger issues and concerns result from individual actions that can affect others dramatically.
Stage Four- Individuative/Reflective
In older adolescence and young adulthood, one learns to be responsible for one’s beliefs and actions. Symbols and Myths reemerge, and are questioned and looked at from another perspective. The questions about meaning, emptiness, and dilemma’s

surface and true experimentation with other beliefs and values begins. I feel that the true spiritual search begins here, yet it can often be difficult, frustrating, and lonely.
Stage Five- Conjunctive Faith
The questions and concerns of adulthood and mid-life become one’s focus here. We call all previous learning into question, and true or real disillusionment can occur. Questions about one’s true identity, purpose, meaning come to the surface, and the integration of myths, symbols and other metaphors act as a guide to deeper personal and spiritual understanding. Here addictions often occur- as does any other search for a quick resolution to answers that are only found in spiritual teachings and their applications to our lives.
Stage Six- Universal Faith
This is the mature faith of living what one believes, and making those principles a consistent guide for all your behaviors, relationships, and actions.. It does not mean perfection, but it does mean an unswerving commitment to oneself, to one’s world, as a spiritual and ethical human being.

Now why did I offer these steps and stages to you… simply because most churches and groups you encounter serve to help you to go beyond step or stage three; Few churches operate out of stage four, yet I believe that this kind of spiritual community has the potential for supporting growth and development into stage six… maybe beyond! These last two stages where we find our spiritual heroes and heroines, but they are also the place where a deep faith, and abiding sense of the grace of God, holy wisdom, and spiritual principles can be found, understood and applied to your lives.

How does this outline serve to open or broaden your understanding of adult development? Can rituals be designed to reflect passage from one of these levels to another? What about a church or a community’s limits or the LCD of consciousness that any community will award or support?

If you were to design a ritual for yourself that would be a public event declaring your new identity, stage of growth, new commitments to the spiritual life, etc. what would it include? Music/ prayers? a round of applause? A devotional statement? Some kind of certificate of achievement? Who would be there in attendance, or who would you want to share in this ritual with you? How would you signify to the world who and what you have become?

A Few Astrological and Esoteric Corollations:
There are stages of the soul’s growth known in esoteric circles and often seen symbolically and measured to connect to certain recurring planetary cycles. These corolations are synchronistic, not causative…
The most common ones or the early ones people speak of are the return of the Moon at age 26-28 and the first return of Saturn at age 28-30. The next in the cycle are the seven year sign changes of Uranus with the ‘mid-life crisis happening between 40-44 for most people… the Chironic squares would be next, and the Chiron return at age 50-52 followed by the second Saturn return at age 56. These times in a person’s life are often turning points and periods of great upheaval, transition, or transformation. There are more markers or times to consider… Up to and including the Uranus return at approximately age 84… Each of these transitions could have a ritual assigned to it….

The Kabbalah and the Kabbalistic years:

At age 11: there is the separation from Mother or necessary nurturing
22: Separation from Father… And from parenting or one’s home…
33: Separation from childhood- personal maturity and sense of self
44: Separation from youth- acceptance of middle age and its outlooks
55: Separation from parenting and possibly from house holding
66: Separation from middle age- welcoming elder responsibilities

Epiphany: The Implications of Adult Baptism
and the need for on going rituals in our lives
Sunday, January 3, 2010
The Reverend Peter Edward Lanzillotta, Ph.D.

As some of you know, the Christmas season is almost over- Today is the ninth day of Christmas, with next Wednesday being the twelfth or Epiphany. That is the final day, the day when the decorations come down, and the celebration of the entire season concludes on the Twelfth Night, the time of revels and parties made famous in Shakespeare’s play.
In our Western religious tradition, this time or date holds a special spiritual significance. Many of you who were raised in the high church traditions of Episcopal, Greek, Russian, Armenian, or Roman Catholic are familiar with the day of Epiphany in its original meaning, where Epiphany is translated as the word for “God appearing.” As our western church tradition explains it, Epiphany commemorates the day when the Three Wise Men arrived at the manger and presented the Christ-child with their reverent gifts. Among the various interpretations of the religious significance of the Wise Men’s visit and gifts include that these strangers symbolize the outer recognition of the Christ’s appearance on earth. Narrow theology states that even wise Pagans like the Magi can come to recognize the only true God born in Jesus. But there is a more inclusive broader understanding! It states that whenever a sense of true wisdom or recognition happens to us, this is our personal epiphany; This discovery or expansion in our awareness can be made without either a specific date on a calendar, nor can be determined by one’s age or life experience for its occurrence. Often times, however, there are synchronistic signals- in events, experiences, conversations, our dreams or meditative practices, that do give us significant clues…
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So that is the second, deeper meaning to Epiphany- one that relates to our personal insights and our spiritual journeys.
An epiphany occurs whenever a greater sense of God or reality appears to us. Like Jesus, and his connection to his adult baptism, our personal epiphanies can be acknowledged in a ritual that symbolizes a person’s readiness to live a more directed, a more focussed, or spirit-centered life. Epiphany can become a time when God’s appearing signals or when each person is ready to declare their own spiritual and ethical journey, and accepts the symbolic ritual of a designed adult baptism as an invitation and as an affirmation for their lives.
While it is accurate that one’s physical birth sets out our genetic patterns, cosmic designs, and the start of one’s human potential- it is only that- our incarnational starting point- We progress, mature, and hopefully evolve from those origins into higher, and deeper stages of development.
Orthodox churches keep a veneration of Epiphany for another reason. Epiphany also celebrates the day of Jesus’ baptism by John in the River Jordan- this event symbolized the time in his life when he was mature and ready to claim his identity, his holy purpose; it is when he publicly began to live out his spiritual mission for all humanity….
So, as a corollary, it could be said that the true start of a person’s life, spiritually speaking, comes at one’s baptism, not just at one’s physical birth….
Our spiritual birth comes to us during unusual times in one’s life; Most often, it comes during times of crisis, deep insight, after much esoteric study, or as the result of some
truly life changing or transformative experience.

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Over the centuries, Religions, East & West, will reflect on the human need for a more spiritual or deeper understanding of life’s events. If they are aware and flexible enough, if they are discerning and adaptable, Their clergy will create or design rituals that address those concerns.
Their clergy design rituals to reflect the beliefs and values of the church and its people, and these rituals also underscore the teachings about the nature of our humanity- About the nature of God; about the value of their church or community, and what its people believe, and are willing to support. Rituals are used to reinforce what a spiritual person or their community trusts as the truth; what they trust and affirm, how they desire to live, or what they clearly and knowingly practice and preserve.
Unfortunately, many of these historical rituals of affirmation and change, as they are given or practiced, have lost a lot of their value. One of the main criticisms are how they no longer make good theological or spiritual sense, therefore they are irrelevant. One of the main reasons why they have become less meaningful is that they are skewed to be done or used during only the first quarter or third of our lives. There is a great lack of affirmation for aging and for mature spiritual development. There is an absence of recognizing how we mature personally and change spiritually once we enter into adulthood.
In our wider Judeo-Christian culture, we seem to have an adequate recognition of human beginnings and early development. We are given either a bris or a baptism or christening…

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Then in early adolescence, either a mitzvah or a confirmation, or possibly some “coming of age” ceremony marking the early transitions of self and soul. Without unpacking the symbolism of each of these rites and rituals, let me state that the first set honors childhood, the family, the inclusion into a faith community. The second set of rites and rituals recognizes the next step or stage in life- called adulthood. Traditionally, we hold Confirmations, Affirmations, and Mitzvahs… You see, in the Early Church there was no mention or consideration of a time called adolescence; It is a completely made up interval… Recently, much has been made of the whole concept of new steps and new stages to our lives. As a necessary corrective, one no longer recognizes that a person of 14 is ready for adulthood. We have begun to extend the stages for adult development to include many of the psychological, sociological, and physiological changes that every person goes through over the span of their lifetime.
Previous to our modern era, the early emphasis for rituals made more sense. All that emphasis on infancy and childhood was sufficient to a society when few children lived a long time, or when it was stated that you were a man or a woman at age 13, and a very old person at 40- remember, when these rituals were first created, the average life expectancy less than 50 years!
Presently, let me see now, are there any rites and rituals for adults??? Well, there is a marriage ceremony, and when it is well designed, the service can include some recognition of maturity and change, awareness of growth, etc. But what do we have after that? Society and social science have recognized various adult stages, but what about our churches? What do our churches and spiritual communities recognize?
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What do most churches offer after the marriage ritual??
Well, let’s see, umm… There’s your funeral! (Now, I will not stop to speculate on why those two events are linked…)
While society readily understands the process of getting older, unfortunately, this understanding is almost always expressed in negative terms, as if age was a disease that anyone could truly avoid. You all have know the “panic” some people experience at turning 30,40, 50- and all the media hype that tries to convince you that you must do everything you can
to look and act younger… Thankfully, our advances in sociology and medicine have investigated events and have named significant passages such as “the empty nest”, female and male menopause, retirement, becoming a grandparent, etc., where each group of researchers offering theories of how those specific events could change one’s perception of self and society, life and the aging process. (Of course, I love the idea that 50 is the new 30; and that old age does begin until you reach 75…)
Churches and spiritual communities, however, are lagging way behind. Few of them have recognized the need to extend ritual and meaning to the other two-thirds of our lives. Instead of learning from the indigenous or tribal societies that wisely have always included a larger set of rituals for these biological and social changes, churches have been stuck with nothing to offer in between marriage and death. They seem to miss the other meaning of Epiphany; that Jesus’ ministry started with his baptism in the River Jordan when he was age 30- or when at least half of his life was over. In accord with Rabbinic laws of his times, a man had to reach at least the age of 30 before he would be anywhere near ready to be given any credence or authority as a teacher. …
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How do we recognize or determine readiness today? Maybe that is where we should begin… at age 30… Since our society has such a prolonged adolescence, often extending into the post college years, maybe adulthood actually does not begin until one reaches 30! Many women, they claim that men grow up by 30!
But then a larger question arrives and confronts us- namely, what defines maturity? How does it differ from age? Maturity indicates a certain level of experience, awareness, or comprehension based on learned skills, reliable reasoning, trial and error, and the wisdom we can get from it all.
We all know people who do not “act their age” which can be said as a criticism or as a statement of admiration, depending on its context…
In a correlative way, one’s spiritual identity as a person does not remain as a child but changes- changes in a way that needs to be acknowledged and affirmed within a religious community, within this church. What are some of the possibilities? Well, in a few churches, there are special ceremonies designed to celebrate one’s independence, be they a college graduation or a divorce ceremony!
Some innovative churches recognize that when a person wishes to change her/his name, or when they accept a new role or a new status, such as when all their children have grown, or when a spouse has died, and when a person retires or first becomes a grandparent. Churches are places for such celebration and affirmation. Could our church include ceremonies for these rites of passage, and what about rituals that affirm and recognize a person’s spiritual maturity? Traditionally, there is a special category of ceremonies that would be classified as religious ordinations and spiritual initiations that differ
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from church membership rituals. While it is true that new member’s ceremonies are primary in importance to the life of the community because these new members now willingly accept an increased role and responsibility for the church and its mission and purpose, its security and its vitality. Membership, however, usually does not address adequately how a person’s spiritual journey and the process of discovery and inspiration are to be identified, acknowledged or understood. That is closer to having an Odyssey Sunday where members are invited to share their journeys.
Ordination and Initiation are also important rites…
Throughout the history of the church, an ordination is an event that marks a readiness or a maturity for community leadership. It is usually given after receiving a rigorous theological education, internships, and after passing exams that are both psychological and professional.( exception-store front preachers and mail order ministers!)
Initiation is quite different. Becoming initiated signifies entering into a relationship known as discipleship. This can involve entry into a Mystery school or into a more structured spiritual way of life under the direction of a master or a highly evolved teacher. Generally, these events have been best known as going into an Eastern or Western monastery, receiving tribal training, or working with a guru. Often, it accompanies some transformative experience, personal crisis or it represents a lifelong yearning for answers and for a deeper, richer understanding of faith in their lives.
Sometimes ordination and initiation coincide in a person’s life, but it is a rare person who experiences both, or attests to their successful integration of all their training,
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discipline, and experience into the service of a community. In other words, both of these rites are unusual, transformative and decisive steps- they are not to be undertaken without a lot of soul-searching readiness, and a solid faithful commitment.
In the Protestant and liberal churches, there is another understanding of ordination and initiation. There is an implied ordination for all those who are baptized or christened. This is the famous statement of Martin Luther who believed in a “priesthood or all believers.” This teaching states that by accepting baptism, especially as an adult, you willingly become a leader and a teacher by your moral and spiritual example.
It states that while your baptism does not cancel the capacity to sin, it does prepare you potentially to become a light unto the world, and as such an enchristed person, you are called to be a witness to God and to act as a model for all humankind. Does this surprise you? It surprised me. When I first read this, it was during the years of seminary… Before that, none of the churches I visited or experienced in my life ever taught me what baptism could truly mean!!!
Here is where our wider and more inclusive reinterpreted practice of adult baptism or our ability to design a special rite of passage for adults in our community could be both a healing and joyous occasion. It would affirm our wider understanding of how that individual has changed. As a brief but meaningful ritual, it could be a public declaration that this person’s new commitment to their spiritual path in life can be positively recognized.

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We would honor that person’s depth of increased commitment to spiritual values, insights, and behavior as a sincere marking of their personal and spiritual maturity.
By including opportunities to celebrate life’s adult passages, changes and growth, by offering other members a chance to share their journeys, we are making room for an expanded, more spiritual approach where our community can serve the growth, wisdom and maturity of all its members.
If you were to design a ritual for yourself that would be a public event declaring your new identity, stage of growth, new commitments to the spiritual life, etc. what would it include? Music/ prayers? a round of applause? A devotional statement? Some kind of certificate of achievement? Who would be there in attendance, or who would you want to share in this ritual with you? How would you signify to the world who and what you have become?
My question is this: if any member of this community would like to participate and be acknowledged in such a service? Maybe its time for you to accept and acknowledge that you a “Uvangelical” and that you have been “born again” by your involvement, commitment and practice what your community lives and teaches?
Who will accept this new outlook, and be willing to declare their journey publicly? I await your responses. AMEN

Pastoral Reflection: The Media And Our Minds

“We should be careful, Thoreau once warned, “to treat our minds as innocent and ingenuous children whose guardians we are- and to be careful what objects and what subjects we thrust upon their attention…
Every thought that passes through the mind helps to wear and tear it… to deepen its ruts, which, as in the streets of Pompeii, evince how much it has been used. How many things there are concerning which [their content and impact upon us] we might well deliberate whether we had better known [or rejected] them.”

For some time now, there has been much made of how the media, and the freedom of speech and expression impacts the lives of children and adults. With Christmas now gone, and with big screen Televisions, computers, phones, etc., being the best sellers again this year, I expect that more needs to be said about the impact of the media during this last decade and into the foreseeable future.
There is no question about it- we live in a media saturated culture… In fact, we are now inventing or discovering new problems that were absent only 20 years ago… Like carpal tunnel problems from texting excessively, or video game addiction… Some other troubling examples of the overwhelming energy and influence would include: hate radio, lack of enough children’s TV programming vs. violent video games, the availability of bomb construction via the Internet, the lack of civility in culture, and the coarseness of everyday advertising and language. These and other issues ask us to examine and evaluate just what kinds of communication are best to encourage or what kinds of language, ideas, and expression can best serve to create our necessary social dialogue and the direction of our national moral compass that best guides us towards a just and compassionate society.

I believe that Thoreau would weigh into this discussion on the side of prudence and recommend or favor dialog that inspires, not that demeans human dignity and self-worth. He states, “As you see, so at length, will you say.”
Do our perceptions dictate our reality? If so, what are we feeding to one another that encourages virtue and values, altruism, idealism, and the willingness “to love your neighbor as yourself?” While the freedoms to say and do are vitally important, I am asking out loud whether or not this generation has confused the implied responsibilities for those freedoms with the opportunities for amoral license and being naive about the consequences? Ask yourself to ponder this question, and reflect on Thoreau’s words for us today.

“We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us in our soundest sleep. I know of no more
encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor. It is something to be to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful, but it is more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which we morally can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts.”

On Life’s Purpose by Henry David Thoreau

I wish to begin this [year] well; to do something in it that is worthy of it and me; to transcend my daily routine; to have my immortality now; in the quality of my daily life. May I dare as I have never done. May I attain to a youth never attained. I am eager to report the glory of the universe; may I be worthy of it, for it is [only] reasonable that we should be more worthy [of life] at the end of each year, than at its beginning.

Harry Emerson Fosdick

[Nobody ever finds a life worth living. One has to make it worth living. All the people to whom life has been abundantly worth living have made it so by [making] an interior, creative, and spiritual contribution of their own back to life and to others.
Is life worth living? Most people seem to think that is a question about the Cosmos, or about God. No, my friends, that is a question about the inside attitude of you and me.]

It’s Time

It’s time that we understand our role as stewards of this planet,
That we respect and honor the delicate balance of our world

It’s time that we realize, “We are all one people”,
That separateness is an illusion and that, in truth, we are all connected.

It’s time that we see past the veil of illusion called separateness,
and understand just how connected we really are,

That we are all made from the same substance of the universe,
and by harming another we are only harming ourselves.

It’s time that we see past the color of one’s skin or the name of one’s God,
That we realize we are merely traveling parallel paths leading up the same mountain.

It’s time that we stop searching for happiness outside ourselves,
That we turn our attention inward and tune into the calm peace of our soul.

It’s time that we take responsibility for making the world a better place,
That we strengthen the foundation of our communities by being of good character.

It’s time that we ask, “how can I make a difference?”,
That we leave this world in a little better shape than when we arrived

It’s time that we listen to each other with empathy and compassion,
That we overcome the fear in our mind so that we can experience the love in our heart.

It’s time that we get past our ego and discover our innate spiritual essence,
That we realize our selfish desires and serve humankind unconditionally, with love.

It’s time that we “Love all, serve all”,
That we be at peace.

ITS TIME

Some Guidelines for Making New year Resolutions:

The basic ground rules for making effective and hope-filled resolutions is to avoid the extremes- to avoid making them too easy or too difficult. The first extreme asks too little or almost nothing more from us than going through the motions and being willing to receive a small satisfaction from their accomplishments. The other extreme of difficulty programs in failure, encourages disappointment, or excuse-making when most of us are in need of affirmation, more self knowledge, and a greater ability to empathize with what we most need to do for ourselves and our world. The best approach to resolution making is to choose ones that make us stretch, but that will not break us, resolutions that assist our growth and learning without intimidation or being too easy.
Some years, the tasks and resolutions we choose have a different theme or intensity to them. As a part of change, growth, and the cycles of our human experience, some years our resolutions will be intensely personal. Other times in our lives, our resolutions will be more community based or motivated by larger aims and goals. Some years will focus on personal behavior, relational shifts and changes, or career objectives. However you choose them or will choose to express them to yourself and to others, there can become an indication of what will be happening in your life this year.

As an exercise in fulfilling our hopes and dreams, be sure to choose no more than 3 things you wish to focus on in the coming months… Be sure to make your goals workable, and with sincere effort, attainable so that you can avoid unnecessary discouragement or failure…

Enlist the support of role models and trusted advisors… While receiving support and guidance from your family and friends, that choice is not without its hazards! In some of the latest studies, as just one example, having fat friends or chubby family members, helps you to gain weight! Unless you choose a “buddy” system, where both family members or friends commit equally to the goals, it could derail your best personal plans!

Choose people you truly admire, or people whose accomplishments are in the area you are trying to achieve, let them inspire you! Consult experts in the designated area, be they organizational people who help you with clutter or work routines, or nutritionists, or family therapists, or clergy and other spiritual guides… The best guidelines is this: If they have been able to do it for themselves, they will be better coaches or guides than if they only have the right words…

Lastly, no matter how you decide on change, growth, awareness, etc., in the final appraisal or result, its up to you- your perceptions, discipline, understanding, strength, etc…… Please remember, change or improvement is no an easy journey… there are often some side steps or fall backs along the way…. Don’t quit! rest and relax… take some time off if you need to, but stay with your vision of yourself, and the goals your heart wishes to attain! Blessings!

TODAY
There are two days in every week of our lives about which we should not worry. They are two days that need to be kept free of fear and apprehension. One of these days is Yesterday, with all its mistakes, and cares, its faults and blunders, its aches and pains.
Yesterday has passed forever beyond our control. All the money in the world cannot bring back yesterday. We cannot perform a single act we had performed, we cannot erase a single word we had said. Yesterday is gone. The other day we should not worry about is Tomorrow, with all its possible adversities, its burdens, its large promises and poor performances. Tomorrow is also beyond our immediate or complete control.
Tomorrow’s sun will rise, either in splendor or behind a mask of clouds-but it will rise. Until it does, we have no stake in Tomorrow, for it is as of yet, unborn. This leaves only one day-Today. Any person can fight the battles of just one day. It is only when you and I add the burdens of those two awful eternities-Yesterday and Tomorrow- that we break down, or feel that we cannot go on.
It is not the experience of Today that drives a person mad-it is remorse, regret, some resentment or bitterness for something that happened Yesterday and the fearful anticipation or dread of something that might happen, or what Tomorrow might bring.
So remember: Today is all that we can live, and we can only live that day and every day, one at a time. Anonymous

Of Time
She wondered if he could ever see how often, although silently, she pleaded for a moment of his time.. and she recalled a Danish folk tale about an angel who came down to Earth to plead for a moment of any person’s time. In exchange, the angel would give eternal life.
The angel’s gift was never given, for everyone she encountered had one foot in the past, the other in the future, and no one had a moment to spare, not one, had a moment of time…
She wondered, would there ever be an answer found to life’s questions that is not bound by either yesterday or tomorrow? “Why is it,” she asked, “that life is not being lived in the present tense but a tense present, instead of taking each moment as it is.”
Over and over, she framed her unspoken plea, yet every once in a while an angelic moment in time would occur, which could be our moment, our promise of eternity. B. Devito, adapted

Olde English Exhortation

Take time to be friendly, it is the road towards happiness.

Take time to read, it is the foundation of wisdom.

Take time to play, it is the secret of youth.

Take time to dream, for it is your higher reality.

Take time to observe, a day is too short otherwise.

Take time to laugh, it is music for the soul.

Take time to work, it is the price for success.

Take time to think, it is the source of power.

Take time to love and be loved, it is the privilege of gods.
ANON

Rilke’s reflections
I’m living just as the century ends. A great leaf that God and you and I have covered with writing

Turns now overhead, in strange hands.

We feel the sweep of it like a wind We see the brightness of a new page
Unmoved by us, the fates take its measure and look at one another, Saying nothing.

Your first word of all was light. And time began. Then for long you were silent

Your second word was man, and fear began which grips us still.

Are you about to speak again? I don’t want your third word.

Promises To Yourself for The New Year

Promise to be strong enough that nothing said or done can disturb or take away your peace of mind

Promise to make all your friends feel that they are important

Promise to think of only the best, to work for only the best, and
to make the best come true.

Promise to be just as enthusiastic about the successes of others as you are about your own.

Promise to forget the mistakes of the past and press on toward greater achievements in the future.

Promise to wear a cheerful expression and to give everyone you
meet a smile

Promise to give so much effort to the improvement of yourself
that you have no time to criticize others

Promise to be too big to worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear, and too happy to permit the presence of trouble in your life

Anonymous

NOW

Now is the time, the only time we have, to climb the mountains of doubt and despair and attain a new view of the possibilities that await us… A vision of life that lies out above and beyond imposed or previously accepted limits….

Now is the time to renew the earth’s bounty and blessings that have been ruined by greed and our own tyrannies…

Now is the time to join with friends and neighbors to chant a new litany of hope…

Now is the time to give roses… And not wait until they adorn a grave…
Now is the time for grace and gratitude to reign; and to hold hands with justice and compassion.

Now IS the time….