Soar above the winds of war

Soar above the windswept night, into the light of love, into the shelter beyond the storm, where peace flows like a river and you are held in heaven's gentle arms forever.

Today's world is explosive.  The Middle East is waking up after sleeping through more dictators than even South America can boast of as the rest of the world watches breathlessly. Most likely every government in the world is praying its people are going to bed well fed tonight so tomorrow will be business as usual.  

Meanwhile everyone knows the economy isn't stable - in the U.S. or anywhere - and even if people everywhere do stand up or die for their right to self determination and self-government, the stage is set for some humble pie-eating years ahead for all of us. 

So, what do you do when the world is stirring insanely around you?  


Personally, I would find that place of love within to which I would surrender completely, like falling through a mile-high cloud.  I would let the love of God flood my interior world so completely that it would flow out into my life and embrace all who come near me.  

While, politically, yes, I believe in power to the people with all my being. I also believe in first receiving the power of God and then allowing the power of God move through me out into the world.  It seems to me that the only difference between a person on the street protesting and the man in the palace cowering, is that one has power and the other doesn't.  Would the one who doesn't act any differently in the future if he had that power he is seeking?  Unless he is surrendered to God, who is the One Power of the universe, he is just as vulnerable to the temptation to abuse power as those petty dictators like Egyptian President Mubarak.  

Humankind has always hungered for power and has always sought it where it is not.  If we listen to that still soft voice whispering within our hearts, calling us to its infinite reservoir of love and draw in that love, which is the only real power there is, we will find the power we seek.  It isn't in a palace or in an oil well, or on Wall Street or in your stock portfolio.  It is right here, inside you.  It is the calm behind the storm.  It is the stillness before the sound of gun shots ringing through the square.  It is in the peace that comes when you surrender to God's love, within you, and it will change your life and all of our lives, forever.

My spiritual quest began when I was 13 on a stormy Saturday night during Lent when somehow, in some incomprehensible way, the pure love of Christ outshone the chaos in my home, changing my life forever.  


While the household was spinning around me, I was there, but not there, and somehow remained completely untouched by the chaos that night. I know I often wanted to escape but the only escape was to go within, not in some soul-splitting way, but in a quiet reflective intentional way. From as far back as I can remember and throughout my life, there had always been this soft feeling in my heart that remained untouched by some of the brutality and chaos that stormed around me.  At times, when my turbulent childhood  felt threatening, somehow that soft quiet lovely place within me seemed to reach around my heart and hold me - sometimes all through the night as I sobbed away the fear that frightened me so badly then.  


That night was a cornerstone moment for me. Even today, as the Bahrain are in the streets seeking their freedom from tyranny and abusive power and Egypt is celebrating its victory marches of a week ago, and Wisconsin is stirring over a proposed anti-union bill, the March winds of Buffalo from that night still calm my frightened soul.  That long ago night, the winds off Lake Erie had been beating against the windows in our old drafty house all evening, almost like the approaching drums of war.  I realized then, as I know now and have always known since, that no matter what happens around me, it cannot and will not ever change the love I feel from our God within me.  


I didn't know then there was really another world, as I do now, or that there was a spiritual realm of such incomprehensible and ineffable beauty and power, as I do now. I didn't know then that this whole world is, as Shakespeare so perfectly described it, a mere stage and we but players on it.  It's probably the longest running non-Hollywood produced thriller.  It's epic.  I think that's all I can say about it.  It's epic. And, it's time that show goes off the air to make room for the ultimate reality show. I honestly think the ultimate reality show begins right there, in the center of your being, right there inside your beautiful mind, next to your tender compassionate heart.


I know our future is uncertain.  Maybe the world has never been as volatile as it has been this last month and still every day the news reveals more chaos.  So, maybe there never was a better time than right now to fall in love with God. There was never a better time to surrender to God's most passionate love for you and to allow yourself to give up your fear, your control, relax all your anxieties, let go of all your goals, agendas, ambitions, grievances, complaints and  plans - at least for an hour or two - and just let yourself feel God's love flow through you.  Maybe it's like learning to float on the lake when you were a child.  At first it was hard, then it was easy and then you could just float on the water all day, if someone didn't call you in.  


When I was a child, it was God's love that saved me.  Today, as an adult, it is still God's love that saves me. Only now, I share it with you.  I understand your fear.  I invite you into a world of peace, of love, where that's all there is.  It's beautiful and quiet and radiant and fragrant and it leads to a place of such power that nothing in this world even comes anywhere close to it.  Come away from the madness and let the love of God embrace you as only a great lover can. Stay awhile, as long as you can, and maybe, just maybe things will be different when you return to your life.

"Just meditate like Christ"

Free at last!!

"There's something in the soul 

that cries out for freedom."  

 - President Obama

God save the people

When wilt thou save the people?

Oh God of mercy when?

The people, Lord, the people

Not thrones and crowns,

But men

Flowers of thy heart 

O God are they

Let them not pass like weeds away

Their heritage, a sunless day

God save the people 

God save the people, not thrones ... not governments, not dark powers, not principalities, but the precious children of God's heart.  

The words of Godspell have been ringing in my heart over these past couple of weeks as I watched the news coming out of Egypt.  In so many ways, it's a miracle that the people have finally found the courage to speak out and stand up for their freedom.  


Throughout our history on Earth, people have risen up against oppression, against the cruelty of dictators and malevolent monarchs, against exploitive economic conditions and systems.  Since the beginning of recorded history, the story of the human race on Earth has always been about the liberation of the human being from any dark power over them, against any selfish force or system that would silence them, suppress their creativity, oppress their own self determination, autonomy and self expression. It has been the root of all revolutions, uprisings.  It is at the center of the Israeli-Palestinian conflicts, the Irish-British conflicts, the power struggles in Haiti for several hundreds of years.  


Today, that ancient song is now being sung in Egypt.  I truly believe that as each nation stands up for freedom and the dignity of each and every human being within its borders, the human race becomes more whole.


If collectively we are one being, one single human orchestra playing - all together - a magnificent symphony in  harmony, then we all need to play our own parts, sing our own parts, listen to our own hearts and play out of those self possessed hearts, until the whole human race resounds with the angelic chorus.  


For too long petty dictators have usurped their power, over taxed the people, manipulated and exploited the people selfishly.  The story in Egypt is archetypal, symbolic of the human struggle for freedom, and its president Mubarak is no different.  Although a humble man in the beginning of his presidency, according to veteran newsman Dan Rather, Mubarak managed to stay in power for close to 30 years while imprisoning and even torturing those who would oppose him.  Cashing in, for his own personal wealth, the billions of dollars sent to Egypt from the United States each year, he amassed more than a billion dollars which he squirreled away in a Swiss bank account while his overtaxed and overburdened people staggered under a 20 % unemployment rate.   

Shall crime bring crime forever

Strength aiding still the strong?

Is it thy will, O Father

That men shall toil

For wrong?

Oh, no, say thy mountains

No, say thy skies

Man's clouded sun shall brightly rise

And songs be heard, instead of sighs

God save the people! 

The news stories of Egypt's poverty, of whole families scouraging garbage dumps for food or items to sell, living among the tombs in graveyards for protection from the searing sun overhead, breaks my heart unbearably. It is the timeless story of man's inhumanity to man, of man's struggle for freedom - in any culture, time or nation.


As I watch the jubilation in the people's faces as they finally - after these 30 years of oppression - stand up and speak out, I am reminded of the joy that comes when we finally face the oppressor - whether political, economic or personal - and demand our freedom, our dignity, and our God-given creative rights.  


If we are each a bright star of light and power, and yet we allow a dictator or any system or person to dominate and control us, we have lost our brilliance, our divine power, and consequently lessened God's glory on Earth.  Each and every one of us must insist on our own dignity, our own right to free expression and creative freedom.  


This fight for freedom in Egypt, the birthplace of civilization, gives me hope that we are growing closer to the day when all of humanity will be free and will live up to our divine right to take our rightful place in the great human concert.  Our true maestro only asks us to play our instrument to the best of our ability, to sing from our heart.  He or She does not tell us what tune to play or how to play it, only to play with all our heart.


As I see the determination of the bright young people rallying for their freedom in Egypt, I am hopeful that this idea of freedom will spread throughout the world.  If enough people gather together there is no power that can stand in the way of a people determined to be free.  


As an American, I know this is true.  Perhaps we Americans take this for granted, but if there is only one thing that we can say with some sense of pride and dignity, our founding fathers - and not necessarily all those who led the government since - knew that all people are created equally with equal rights under God and the truth of who we were created to be, divine beings in human bodies, would not, and could not ever be realized until we were free.  The real work of our lives and souls begins then.  Once we are free, then we begin to work to find and bring forth our own inner light to realize and live by its power and creativity. 


I support Egypt's courageous pursuit of independence, and stand with all people struggling for their right to live lives of grace and dignity in full creative self expression.  I admire the courage of the people who had the sheer nerve and conviction to face whatever Mubarak's secret police might do to them. I also offer a silent prayer for their peaceful transition out of oppression and poverty into freedom and prosperity.