In my last blog I spoke about how we are all source (with a small ’s’) and invited us to really truly own that — to step fully into our power as co-creators and manifestors.  I realize that can be a challenging thing.


We live in a country right now where many of us feel powerless to change the destruction of our values and ethics.  We are witnessing the tearing apart of families seeking asylum here in this country.  We are watching racism rear its ugly head again, and witnessing it being supported by the White House.

We are witnessing and experiencing stronger weather — more tornados, stronger hurricanes, greater frequencies of flooding, volcanos erupting.  Mother Nature is reminding us of what happens when we do not care for Her.


With all that is happening in the outer world, no wonder we feel disheartened and disempowered in our inner world.


But here’s the thing…


When we create change and transformation, it is not by opposing or changing what is already created.  It is by creating what we want independently of what we want to change.  What we want changed, we dis-create, release, let die.


There is an old Cherokee story:


An old grandfather said to his grandson, who came to him with anger at a friend who had done him an injustice, “Let me tell you a story.  I, too, at times have felt a great hate for those that have taken so much, with no sorrow for what they do.


But hate wears you down, and does not hurt your enemy.  It is like taking poison and wishing your enemy would die.  I have struggled with these feelings many times.”


He continued, “It is as if there are two wolves inside me.  One is good and does no harm.  He lives in harmony with all around him, and does not take offense when no offense was intended.  He will only fight when it is right to do so, and in the right way.


But the other wolf, ah!  He is full of anger.  The littlest thing will set him into a fit of temper.  He fights everyone, all the time, for no reason.  He cannot think because his anger and hate are so great.  It is helpless anger, for his anger will change nothing.


Sometimes it is hard to live with these two wolves inside me, for both of them try to dominate my spirit.”


The boy looked intently into his Grandfather’s eyes and asked, “Which one wins, Grandfather?”


The Grandfather smiled and quietly said, “The one I feed.”   
[http://www.firstpeople.us/FP-Html-Legends/TwoWolves-Cherokee.html]


What we feed is what will grow and manifest.  If we want to change something, we must first stop feeding what we want changed, and then create the new changed thing to feed and feed that.  If we feed justice, compassion, love, beauty and harmony, the opposing forces will atrophy and die because there is no energy flowing into them.  We have done nothing other than direct our attention and creating power to what we want to create!


In creating attention is key.  It is the food that feeds what we create.  Attention includes our focus, our intention, the work we do, our negative or positive thoughts, any self-conversations we have, our fears, and more.  Attention can be positive or negative.


And this is why it is so important that we be conscious of our power to create!  This is why it is so important that we be conscious and aware of our thought patterns.


If we are putting too much negativity toward what we want to create, it will create itself with that energy — and not in the way we desire it to.  Then we will place the blame out there, or use it as proof that our doubt (the negativity we directed at our creation) was correct.  We are stuck in a cycle where we become frustrated creators, and end up feeling powerless to bring what we want into our lives.


If we are aware and conscious and work to feed our creation with positive energy: love, harmony, hope, desire, compassion; it will create itself in a beautiful way.  We will be amazed at what happens.  Confidence will come back into our being.  We will wake up one morning realizing that we are fully standing in our own Power, our own Light.


In both creating experiences, it was our attention that did the creating. The Universe listened and acted to support where our focus was.


This is also why I co-create with Spirit.  Spirit helps to awaken me, to beckon me to recognize my fears, doubts, negative thought forms and patterns.  Spirit invites me to look at them, release them, heal what needs to be healed.  All along, Spirit holds the positive outlook I need until I am able to step fully into it.  When I am ready, Spirit boosts my positivity and amazing things are created.


Co-creation is an invitation to heal and grow as we create.  Co-creation is an invitation to follow the guidance of the One, the Sacred in all that we do.  Co-creation is an invitation to learn to master the art of feeding the good wolf.


Which wolf are you feeding today?  Which wolf do you want to be feeding? ​

Stephen Colbert suggested that the best Father's Day present we could give our fathers this year was to call our Senators and Representatives and demand an end to the cruel practice of separating children from their parents at the border. (www.cbs.com/shows/the-late-show-with-stephen-colbert/video/nGLHPcmI8LhqGejRSjTOd5WL8tdtU4hm/jeff-sessions-cites-the-bible-in-separating-children-from-parents/)

For me, this is a perfect Father's Day gift for my father.  He is the one who taught me to be an activist.

As a pastor, he spoke out against corruption and injustice.  I remember when I was in first through fifth grade, he wrote letters to the editor calling for an end to the corruption of the town police department.  We had homeless families staying with us from time to time as well.

In high school when we had moved to northern NYS (almost Canada) be began a refugee ministry at the church he pastored.  This was back when Canada closed its borders to refugees seeking asylum.  Refugees could present themselves at the border, schedule a hearing date and then had to wait in the US for that date.  Our small city was the place they usually ended up.  

My father worked with the members of the congregation to create a living space in the church basement.  We housed many refugees as they awaited their hearings.  Listening to their stories was one of the most memorably transformative times in my young life.  It sparked deep activism in me.

Social justice work is taught by our actions more than any other way.  My dad instilled in me a powerful sense of activism by his actions.

So for Father's Day I honored him by contacting my Senators and Representatives.   

Then I took it a step further.  I attended a rally the following day (Monday) morning in support of an undocumented man seeking a visa.  He had applied previously for asylum.  His children were citizens.  His wife was deported on Mother's Day.  On Father's Day he feared being separated from his children.

I held a sign high standing as a witness demanding justice just like my dad taught me to.

I am ever grateful for the lessons he taught me by his actions.  I hope to continue to honor him as I continue to demand that #FamiliesBelongTogether.

​Many of you know that I recently went to a continuing education course in new Jersey and was gone for three Sundays.  This was a development course focused on Creation — how do we successfully create what we want in our lives?  (individually and cooperatively) The last third of the course focused on how to release limiting beliefs and discreate the blocks and obstacles that arise as we go about creating and manifesting our hopes and desires.


The class has me remembering and pondering what I learned in seminary regarding our Creation story/myth.  I took Torah from a Jewish Rabbi and Professor.  He always cracked us up, reminding us to take these Sacred stories with a lightness and humor, not to get bogged down in seriousness.


I remember him talking about Genesis One.  He was explaining to us the meaning of the Hebrew — not the literal translation meaning but the energetic meaning.  He said God did not create creation all by Godself.  What God did was speak creation into being and then allow that creation to become how it wanted to be.  His example:  God told grass to grass and then grass grassed.  The grass itself created itself how it wanted to be.  I was intrigued!


So every living thing has the free will to create itself as it feels intuitively called to be.  Every living thing is endowed with source-ness for its own creating desires.  Cool!  My mind was blown wide open.


Then I found myself reading Hildegaard of Bingen the very next semester in church history, and there it was again.  Hildegaard was writing a vision (Scivias) given to her by God — one in which every creation (even grass itself) contains the spark of God — this Source/Creation/Sacred Energy!  Hildegaard, all those centuries earlier, was writing and explaining this same movement my professor was talking about!


Here I am almost 20 years later sitting in a course that is based off this similar idea/understanding.  The course I took was outside the Christian tradition.  It as outside mainstream thought.  I was stepping out into a very different worldview than I had before.  But it seems, though, we all agree.


The first step in manifesting/creating is to own oneself as source with a small ’s’.  For me that is important.  Spirit is the big “S”.  For me, as source (with a small ’s’), we partner with Source (with a big “S”), and together we co-create.  To do that we need to experience ourselves as creators.


This seems to be a problem for us.  As Marianne Williamson, a spiritual writer, reminds us “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”


So, let us step fully into our power as source, as creators of our lives, as manifestoes of God’s vision.  This is what we were created to do!


Just ask the grass….

​Yesterday was a day of action to state that in this country #FamiliesBelongTogether.


It is terribly sad, disgraceful and angering that I currently live in a country where the powers that be feel it appropriate to separate children from their parents at the border.  it is even more disheartening and angering when a politician misquotes the Bible, as if sacred scripture would support such injustice!


I am proud to be pastoring a progressive congregation where members participated in this day of action.  I have great respect for Martha and Ray who picked up one of our church signs and went to the intersection that leads to Homeland Security ICE field office here in Albequerque, and stood in protest.  Who then moved themselves and stood outside the US Citizenship and Immigration Service office continuing their vigil and peaceful protest.  Two voices — two everyday people — two people of faith who took their faith seriously, risking as Jesus risked to call for justice!


Then last night, as I was winding down my day with Stephen Colbert’s Late Show, Colbert took a moment to speak out against this injustice as well.  He got right down to it, shining a light on this disgraceful policy of our government.  He asked all citizens to stand against these atrocities.  He spoke about the greatest gift you could give your father this Father’s Day is to call your Senators and Representatives and ask for a discontinuation of this unjust policy.  #FamiliesBelongTogether


As a person of faith, as a spiritual leader, I feel that I must speak out against injustice.  Jesus requires it of us if we are to seriously follow in his footsteps.


In the gospel of Mark, Jesus speaks to the disciples about what it means to the greatest, saying, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”  He continues later in that same chapter, “If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea…”


Jesus is about protecting our children.  He is about making sure that our children, all children, are treated with Love, Respect, Mercy, Compassion.  He is about making sure that children are safe, loved and protected.


He is not about tearing families apart just to prove a point, to deter people from seeking sanctuary.  He is about welcoming fully those who seek sanctuary.


I believe that Martha and Ray were being Christ — doing as Jesus would do — as they stood in peaceful silent protest before ICE.  I heard the voice of Christ coming forth as Colbert asked us all to stand up against injustice.  I see Christ’s Light grow each time I witness someone standing in Love and Compassion against injustice, violence, hatred.


I will join my Christ Light — shining the Light of healing and transformation in this darkness.  i will call on those in power to change their ways.  I will continue to hold up those who risk their bodies and voices to speak out again injustice.


I will seek to be Christ in this world.


I invite you to join me….
    because #familiesbelongtogether