This is a new section with some favorite people's thoughts on love, peace, enlightenment, freedom, and all those good things.



























Belief Divides, Love Unites by Chrissie Blaze

I was thinking the other day about how it is different belief systems that divide people. In my early twenties I worked in the Theological Department at King's College London, and met and befriended many young men training to be priests in the Anglican Church. I regarded myself as a "mystic Christian" as I had more metaphysical leanings, which later drew me away from the somewhat narrow confines of the Church. I later joined The Aetherius Society.

However, I maintained some of the friendships from my time at King's College over many years. Only recently, however, I received a letter from a Chaplain I hadn been in touch with for over thirty years. He expressed that he could no longer write to me since I had written a book on prayer (Power Prayer by myself and Gary Blaze).

He said our beliefs are so different on this subject that our friendship could no longer continue. He said his own faith was "hanging on by a thread" and he just needed to get to retirement without me or anyone else knocking him off course. At first I felt angry, and then sad. That a friendship could disintegrate through differing beliefs about prayer, of all things. Prayer - the common thread of ALL religious faith. Prayer - which if said by people of all faiths around the world with true heart can transform our world, despite these different faiths.

Does it really matter if we grow up in the Jewish faith, the Christian faith, the Buddhist faith, the Hindu faith, the Moslem faith? Isn't it our differing beliefs expressed in a dogmatic, fundamentalist manner that is at the heart of the problems of this world? It is this that is the cause of arguments, hatred and wars. Instead, let us find the common ground, which is at the heart of all religious philosophies.

So, I think, we have to get over our beliefs. Certainly the teachings of The Aetherius Society state: "If you are a Christian, be a good one. If you are a Buddhist, be a good one. If you are a Hindu, be a good one."

My own personal belief is that it's what we do that counts. My Spiritual Master, Dr. George King, said that a minute's action is worth hours of theory. We need to translate our belief system, whatever it is, into actions for our world. To express our love in practical ways, such as praying for the healing and peace of our world, helping those who are suffering in financial ways, or through giving of our time and energy. There is so much to do, so few people doing it. It is a huge task to transform our world, but one person can make a huge difference.

Let us instead of debating or arguing about our beliefs; put our belief system to work. When we express the love we feel in our hearts through action for others, then the one person we were will become a greater One. We will then become the one who is aligned more closely with the God within. And that One can make a world of difference. That is the One who can perform the miracles, inspire those around us, and make a profound impact for change upon our world.

P.S. I had just finished writing this when I found that somebody had emailed me an article that illustrated these very points.

This was about the fact that the Archbishop of York quit his position as the Church of England's second most senior clergyman, due to the fact that he could not tolerate the Churches decision to consecrate women as bishops. He would not regard their orders as legitimate.

While it is good to have ideals, it is even better to bring one's ideals in line with reality. The reality is that the dear Archbishop was so wrapped up in his own beliefs that he gave up a position that afforded him great influence for good in the world; a position that he could have used to bring spiritual transformation. The reality is that women have proven themselves to have just as much Spiritual potential, leadership and vision as men in our world. The reality is that Spiritual leadership is desperately needed in whatever gender, religion or nation it is found.





















Enthusiasm is Caring
by Chrissie Blaze

I imagine one of the most difficult tasks of all the truly great spiritual teachers has been dispelling the ingrained apathy of mankind. These great Masters, so imbued with the creative essence of the Divine, and filled with inspiration and the mystic force of Love, are Characters with a capital "C." Most humans, extraordinary in potential yet ordinary in expression, fumble through life and everyday routines with dulled senses, caring little for the true reason for our existence.

We read stories that illustrate how these great Teachers are vibrant, enthusiastic and intense; passionate in the extreme, strong in resolve and Will. We only have to imagine the great Master Jesus as he pushed over the powerful moneylenders' tables in the Temple. What courage! What strength! What character! We think of the courage of the Gandhis, the Vivekanandas, the Mother Theresas and the Martin Luther Kings that changed our world. I was fortunate to know and study with the great Master, Dr. George King, who was so vital, so intense and demanding, that he often appeared to me as ten giants working together in his relentless Cause of global transformation. Click here for an article about Dr. King.

What is Their secret? What can we learn from them? Can we be like them? I think that Marianne Williamson gave us one reason - "our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure."

Do we wish to walk around like robots, dulled to the tragedy of the world? Are we like the character in a recent film who lost his son and beat his fists on the hospital floor saying "God, give me back my son, I will do anything, anything, anything, if I can have my son back." Will we wait too late, as he did, for this heartfelt plea? Will we use our prayers as a last resort? We will live a dull life, wrapped in apathy, listening like mindless sheep to those who would ultimately lead us to our doom? I believe it is enthusiasm that will overcome the disease, apathy. Enthusiasm, faith and works - tempered by Love - can bring our highest ideals into living reality.

Let us express our enthusiasm for life, and put our faith into living reality through our loving works for others. Let our souls sing through prayer, and our Love will go to the far ends of the world - and know that, despite appearances, nothing can stop this!






















Living Love by Mark Tassi
One must realize that one's every thought and every action affects every other form of life, meaning everything, on the planet. None are separate. All are one. If one does not love all, then one does not know what love is, certainly not in its purest and highest aspects. One, however, must live that love. One has to make a show of that love through action, through demonstration. After all, anyone can talk. One cannot say, "I love you" and watch millions starve; one must take action in some way, through prayer or through any other means of service, of helping world conditions. One must not cooperate with evil; one must take a firm stance against it. Sitting apathetically on the sidelines will not do!
It is through heartfelt sincerity that all barriers are broken down. All things, even the rocks themselves, respond to true sincerity born of unconditional Love. There is but One Energy which courses incessantly throughout the vast matrix of creation, and from that energy, all virtue is born.
Let the heart be sincere. Let the Love, which is ever effulgent, ever existent, flow from the heart to penetrate the minds and hearts of all, like the great Oracle, who speaks and thinks and Loves, penetrates timelessness.
Having life’s true purpose firmly fixed, the aspirant goes on to great inner joy. He makes no effort to broadcast this yet his incandescence exudes as a warming glow.
He clings to nothing as he has abandoned attachment to all profit, gain or recognition, caring little for them. For these, he knows, are ephemeral things in a passing world having little to do with reality.
He warms the heart of others, not for want of notice, but for a deep love born from the womb of realization of the divinity within each entity.
He welcomes suffering in all its forms with gladness realizing that God is teaching the little one necessary lessons so that he may be refocused and cleansed.
He stands alone, yet stands with all, tiny yet vast, in soft and gentle glow warmed by a love that does not love one because it loves all.





















Cyanocitta Cristata by Mark Tassi
On the way to the morning class, I spotted the individual in distress, in shock probably, not moving, terrified. I pull over and ran back, prepared to stop traffic if necessary. A blue jay, in the middle of the road, unable to move, paralyzed with fear, a beautiful bird. It wasn’t much. I moved the fine feathered creature out of the road, out of harm’s way. God has many times given this one the opportunity to save the little ones, a chance to show the love that is indeed the divine gift.
Some days later, at the personal abode, many blocks away, walking to the car, I spotted a bird on the lawn near the drive, a blue jay, very similar to the one that I had rescued some days before. I approached slowly; it moved not. Must have been the same bird I thought, injured, no doubt. It did not fly as I approached. "Strange," I thought. "Injured, no doubt." I stooped to pet the multihued, blue feathered creature. "Must have been injured," I perplexing pondered. "No healthy bird would let a human anywhere near, let alone handle it." After several strokes, much to my absolute surprise, Cyanocitta Cristata took to the air, in full flight and perched itself in the tree above.
Amazed, I pondered the nature of relation, the conditions at which all peripheral barriers cease to exist, and the intelligence which drives it.
Does Love transcend all condition? Does appreciation exist on all realms of consciousness traversing all imaginary boundaries? Does trust conquer all unfamiliar terrain? Can there ever be divisions other than in the mind?
Surely, all life is One, expressing itself in the multitudinous forms.






















Concentration
by Swami Sivananda

Those who practise concentration evolve quickly. They can do any work with scientific accuracy and great efficiency. What others do in six hours can be done by one who has concentration within half an hour. What others can read in six hours, can be read by one who does concentration within half an hour. Concentration purifies and calms the surging emotions, strengthens the current of thought and clarifies the ideas. Concentration helps a man in his material progress also. He will turn out a very good amount of work in his office or business house. What was cloudy and hazy before becomes clear and definite. What was difficult before becomes easy now and what was complex, bewildering and confusing before comes easily within the mental grasp. You can achieve anything through concentration. Nothing is impossible for a man who practises regular concentration. It is very difficult to practise concentration when one is hungry and when one is suffering from an acute disease. He who practises concentration will possess very good health and very clear mental vision.

If you read with concentration the Bhagavad Gita, the Ramayana or the eleventh skandha of Bhagavatam several times, you will get new ideas each time. Through concentration you will get penetrative insight. Subtle, esoteric meanings will flash out in the field of mental consciousness. You will understand inner depths of philosophical significance. When you concentrate on any object do not wrestle with the mind. Avoid tension anywhere in the body or mind. Think gently of the object in a continuous manner. Do not allow the mind to wander away.

Serve - Love - Give - Meditate - Purify - Realise (Goal of life is God-Realisation - Swami Sivananda)













Garden of Virtue
by Swami Sivenanda

True love is the greatest power on earth. It rules without a sword and binds without a cord. To love God is to love all. To love all is to love God. Spread the message of love. Practise cosmic love. Love all. Embrace all. Be kind to all. This will remove jealousy, hatred, etc. To love all is the secret of self-realisation and liberation.

The four fundamental virtues are patience, adaptability, kind speech and pure conduct. Justice, temperance, courage and wisdom are also great virtues. Virtue is the golden key which opens the gate to the abode of eternal bliss.

Cultivate divine virtues such as purity, courage, humility, self- restraint, non-violence truth, mercy, faith , etc. Be virtuous. You are on the way to wisdom. In the garden of your heart plant the lily
of love, the rose of purity, the champaka of courage, the mandara of humility and the lady-of-the-night of compassion.

Virtue is knowledge. Virtue is excellence. Knowledge is the ripe fruit of the fine flower of virtue. Think well. All saints teach that you must do good in thought and word and deed. This is the principle of morality.

Serve - Love - Give - Meditate - Purify - Realise (Goal of life is God-Realisation - Swami Sivananda)
















THE PEACE OF FEAR

The "peace" that prevails today is the peace of fear and the peace of preparation. Ignoring the sincere advice of men of wisdom, the great nations of the world are intent upon demonstration of their destructive strength. That way lies war, not peace.
Swami Sivenanda.












THREAT TO PEACE

"In olden times when there was a war, it was a human-to-human confrontation. The victor in battle would directly see the blood and suffering of the defeated enemy.

Nowadays, it is much more terrifying because a man in an office can push a button and kill millions of people and never see the human tragedy he has created.

The mechanization of war, the mechanization of human conflict, poses an increasing threat to peace."
The Dalai Lama






BE SPIRITUALLY ACTIVE!
By Dave Davies

We stand at a Spiritual crossroads. If we stop and think and go inward into the silence we will realize one sure thing. That we need to have our heart spiritually transformed by LOVE to see and encounter the Truth of SELF and of reality.

When the tyrants in their many forms are gone and the Wars have been waged, it is always US the People who remain. Rather than always pointing the finger at some one else's short comings/shouting angrily in expressing our own personal inner turmoil , blaming everyone and everything we must NOW look within and see the darkness of our own hearts and souls. Until we can confront and embrace the darkness that is inside, we will continue to project and 'elect' leaders who 'play out' our inner conflicts.

When we stop listening we give in to Fear and lose our own power of reason.
When we stop being compassionate our hearts turn into stone.
When we stop Loving , we become cold and isolated and spiritually dead.
When we stop Lying we will know Truth.
When we stop trying we give up.
When we stop questioning and speaking out, we give away our Freedom too easily -- and tragically -- our SOULS!
When we stop killing and learn to transmute hatred and the baser emotional instincts we will be saved from our darkest enemy, that which hides like a skulking shadow inside our selves; inside our own 'HEARTS'.

We will not find that which we all seek - Freedom - Love - Truth -- while we allow OTHERS to do our thinking for us and allow the emotional confusion of others to run riot in our own hearts.

LOVE is the ONLY way. LOVE, Yes, LOVE!... In the final analysis it is the ultimate mystery and secret to our survival for our species on this planet.

Whether it makes you feel uncomfortable or not, it is what I believe with all my heart. Misguided politicians with their self-appraising arrogance, self-centered motives and private agendas; vain and corrupt leaders with outmoded†concepts have tried and failed us ALL. We know what we need to do. Why do we need†others to do it for us. Allowing them to dictate to us.

RULE OF THUMB, for Spiritual workers: 'Where LOVE is absent. please, BEWARE!!!' And I don't mean the Love that, just loving your spouse or pet or car. I mean 'selfless LOVE. TRUE LOVE, Expansive LOVE; LOVE of 'inclusion', not of separatism.. Another RULE OF THUMB: 'Question ALL separative ideas, thoughts and doctrines.

Worship TRUE LOVE above ALL others things. The LOVE that is beyond, wealth, power, corruption and manipulation. The LOVE that is beyond all understanding, conscious reason and pure linear thinking. Be' Light' givers. Exude and radiate PURE LOVE. Be a LOVER of Unity and Oneness, in every thought, word, feeling and action. Everything outside of this, should be approached with great caution.

Meditation and certain Spiritual and Yoga disciplines such as Raja Yoga, Kabalah, Reiki etc can make us much more focused and powerful beings on many levels. Physically, Mentally, Astrally (where most of the real work is being done) Psychologically, Intellectually etc etc.

True Meditation is not a passive state. If practiced diligently, seriously and correctly many such techniques can 'enable' us to be more pro-active. True LOVE is not a passive 'energy', it is very active, the greatest of the Spiritual powers to understand and work with.

To begin to see the world around us in a broader, more interconnected and 'clearer' way is a positive sign of Spiritual progress. Never give up being true to your Spiritual goal and listen always to the promptings of the higher self.

As I and others have said before, war is an expression of lower consciousness. You cannot kill, murder and be a Spiritual Person. If we think that we can have both, 'THINK AGAIN' . What ever way you boil it up or down, this is still another great lie. We must ALL make choices . We cannot have it both ways. If we lie to ourselves surely that is a sad and great deception.

KARMA! There's that word again and we can't get away from it, however we wiggle and squirm. It is a Cosmic Law and we CANNOT be forgiven our sins. This is another lie by orthodoxy to get people to support the church even when we mess up. The Master Jesus will never shut you out if you ask for His Forgiveness in TRUE humility, but we all STILL have to pay the Karmic Bill, none the less, IN THE END, at some point. Don't be fooled. Karma is like Cosmic gravity. What goes up, comes down. What goes around, comes around.

How can we can wage WAR simply because we don't like 'other' people, suspect their motives and who we 'think' may at some point harm us. What kind of sick paranoia is that. Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones. Before we look for the 'chip' on someone else's shoulder, we should examine the 'plank' that may be on our own. USE common sense, discernment, detachment and logic.

May all your Karmas be GOOD and Joyous and positive ones. Be Spiritually ACTIVE. We are being watched by higher forces and intelligences other than just the FBI and CIA.

Be TRUE to yourself. Your Higher Self and conscience watches and remembers ALL. IT IS ALL BEING RECORDED for the 'FUTURE'. What we are today†is the sum total of what have 'ever' been throughout ALL previous Lives. Why don't we create our Future TODAY by sharing and giving and LOVING each other. The Universe will do the rest for us. IT is as easy as that!

May LOVE and COMPASSION be your guiding light, your Rule of Thumb, your Politics, your Religion, your creed. Be filled with Love and compassion and please de-program, de-bug.

Today is the beginning of Tomorrow. We can make the future whatever we want.

I have already made my choice. What about you?

I choose to LOVE.

God Bless
Peace, Truth and Love and ONENESS!
Dave








Words on Love and Peace
by Katrina Ure

Love is not an emotional, personal feeling as normally perceived, but something detached, impersonal, for the greater good, glorious and a higher vibration. Love is not so much a feeling but action. And Love in action is service. A wonderful example of this is sending prayers and absent healing to others. It can be done by everybody - no matter who, what or where.

Right now with war and the aftermath, prayers and absent healing is very much needed. If only people truly understood the power of prayer. If only the politicians knew that peace - the end of war, in this case - is actually brought about by the ordinary people, by their sincere prayers. No amount of aggressive tactics, political power, endless talks, peace protests and marches compare to the power of prayer. Prayers bring peace. They radiate spiritual energy, which is the great harmonizer of the universe, the system. The more people pray, the more spiritual energy is released. The world suffers not from an energy crises, but from a spiritual energy crises.

Man has not yet learnt the all-pervasiveness of the Law of Karma - and how true Love, which is Love in action and service - changes it for the better. Love - and so prayers and sending absent healing - not only balances the person's own individual karma (that of the sender and receiver), but has the added effect of balancing the world's karma too.

We should strive to demonstrate our true Love by giving service, by sending prayers and healing at every opportunity. Then we will have created more peace in ourselves, more peace in the other, and more peace in our world.

Katrina Ure
Healer, Counselor, and Editor
Santa Monica, Los Angeles
(310) 393 3166

Love Poems Unlimited
Check out this new website which contains dozens of wonderful love poems. This has one of the largest databases of love poetry available. You can search for an appropriate poem or quote for your loved one.

Essay on Love by Ralph Waldo Emerson
ESSAY V Love by Ralph Waldo Emerson from Essays: First Series, 1841.
The natural association of the sentiment of love with the heyday of the blood seems to require, that in order to portray it in vivid tints, which every youth and maid should confess to be true to their throbbing experience, one must not be too old. The delicious fancies of youth reject the least savour of a mature philosophy, as chilling with age and pedantry their purple bloom. And, therefore, I know I incur the imputation of unnecessary hardness and stoicism from those who compose the Court and Parliament of Love. But from these formidable censors I shall appeal to my seniors. For it is to be considered that this passion of which we speak, though it begin with the young, yet forsakes not the old, or rather suffers no one who is truly its servant to grow old, but makes the aged participators of it, not less than the tender maiden, though in a different and nobler sort. For it is a fire that, kindling its first embers in the narrow nook of a private bosom, caught from a wandering spark out of another private heart, glows and enlarges until it warms and beams upon multitudes of men and women, upon the universal heart of all, and so lights up the whole world and all nature with its generous flames. It matters not, therefore, whether we attempt to describe the passion at twenty, at thirty, or at eighty years. He who paints it at the first period will lose some of its later, he who paints it at the last, some of its earlier traits. Only it is to be hoped that, by patience and the Muses' aid, we may attain to that inward view of the law, which shall describe a truth ever young and beautiful, so central that it shall commend itself to the eye, at whatever angle beholden.

The world rolls; the circumstances vary every hour. The angels that inhabit this temple of the body appear at the windows, and the gnomes and vices also. By all the virtues they are united. If there be virtue, all the vices are known as such; they confess and flee. Their once flaming regard is sobered by time in either breast, and, losing in violence what it gains in extent, it becomes a thorough good understanding. They resign each other, without complaint, to the good offices which man and woman are severally appointed to discharge in time, and exchange the passion which once could not lose sight of its object, for a cheerful, disengaged furtherance, whether present or absent, of each other's designs. At last they discover that all which at first drew them together,ó those once sacred features, that magical play of charms, ó was deciduous, had a prospective end, like the scaffolding by which the house was built; and the purification of the intellect and the heart, from year to year, is the real marriage, foreseen and prepared from the first, and wholly above their consciousness. Looking at these aims with which two persons, a man and a woman, so variously and correlatively gifted, are shut up in one house to spend in the nuptial society forty or fifty years, I do not wonder at the emphasis with which the heart prophesies this crisis from early infancy, at the profuse beauty with which the instincts deck the nuptial bower, and nature, and intellect, and art emulate each other in the gifts and the melody they bring to the epithalamium.

Thus are we put in training for a love which knows not sex, nor person, nor partiality, but which seeks virtue and wisdom everywhere, to the end of increasing virtue and wisdom. We are by nature observers, and thereby learners. That is our permanent state. But we are often made to feel that our affections are but tents of a night. Though slowly and with pain, the objects of the affections change, as the objects of thought do. There are moments when the affections rule and absorb the man, and make his happiness dependent on a person or persons. But in health the mind is presently seen again, ó its overarching vault, bright with galaxies of immutable lights, and the warm loves and fears that swept over us as clouds, must lose their finite character and blend with God, to attain their own perfection. But we need not fear that we can lose any thing by the progress of the soul. The soul may be trusted to the end. That which is so beautiful and attractive as these relations must be succeeded and supplanted only by what is more beautiful, and so on for ever

Dave Davies:

It is fantastic how people are responding to the needs of the soul and promptings of the higher self and spirit, at last - of wisdom, of peace, of truth. The soul is aching for self-expression in a world that seems to keep us disconnected from the soul and each other. The veils of lies and ignorance are being lifted from our physical eyes by the awakening of the spirit, by the relentless gaze of light (Sivas eye) upon the human heart a true transformation is upon us; a spiritual revolution that crosses the boundaries of religion, creed, seperateness.

Thought/reason/intellect ... it is NOW a time for love and peace in the purest and truest sense. Truth/harmony - and the Soul knows this and is calling to us to awaken and maybe now we are ready for real change, and a Spiritual reality that will take us into a wonderful future ... .a time for True Love. The TRUE love that the Master, Dr. George King talked about, as a voice crying in the wilderness. The LOVE that the Master Jesus demonstrated to the ultimate degree, LOVE that the great Masters throughout history have been trying to show us for so many, many years ... it is NOW more than at any other time in the world's history for us to come together, to gather the children unto me, the Divine God seed within, the Father, Siva calling his children homeward. All life is interconnected and every level of human consciousness accessible to the pure in heart. The awareness of the SOUL in mind, in matter ... every thought, feeling, action can and does affect everything else. Rock, stone, plant, heart, mind and soul - and UNIVERSE. That is why dynamic and positive PRAYER, healing and meditation are so important today. It is a 24 hours a day job, 7 days a week job to serve, and to save ourselves. We are going to change the world despite ourselves. Through our positive spiritual action we can create a heaven on earth, and in our dreams, a place where ALL are included . NONE are excluded.Sharing = Survival. Love to ALL beings, Love to all Souls . Love and Peace to all children of the Planet as we embrace the father mother God in all our actions of Loving, Compassion, Healing, Kindness, Offering ... generosity of Spirit, in every waking and sleeping moment of 'selfless giving' and Service to all. Service to the Universe, to the God within. I Bow to the Divinity within you , that understands the significance of what is happening in the world. We are Sacred beings and we must somehow endure the present Karmic conditions, whatever it takes...to rise above and work through this wonderful transformation shed the skins of old Karmic patterns and move into a future full of Truth, Beauty, Light, Love and Peace. This is the time of the great transformation of the Heart Center. Where all is embraced and transmuted in the fire of true Love, we may or may not be able to make it on our 'own' but we WILL make it TOGETHER. What we need now more than anything else...is each other. Love and Peace to all Beings.









LOVE AND PEACE
Richard Lawrence
www.richardlawrence.co.uk

It's funny that we talk about falling in love as though it was a downward process, when true love does the exact opposite: it raises the mind upwards towards the soul. You don't have to be "in love" or experience "love at first sight", you can love all life all the time - not just human life, but animals, plants, inanimate objects, the entire cosmos. Love is a universal energy just waiting to be used. It is above and beyond sentimentality of any kind, let alone possessiveness. It is sacrifice, honesty and effort as well as kindness, gentleness and caring. It is a hard taskmaster and a forgiving friend. But, above all, it is the key to world peace.

There is a world of difference between peace and political compromise. Peace is a state of being - you have to first experience it within yourself in order to manifest it in the world as love. Peace is the yin to the yang of love - wherever you have the one, the other must also be present. Even the most committed and dedicated workers for peace need to rekindle their minds and hearts in the flame of love; and the true lovers of humanity will sometimes need to bathe in the waters of peace. The more peace you find, the more love you can express, leading to greater peace and the capacity to give more love. And so it continues onwards and ever upwards. Falling in love? Ascending through love, I'd say.










Peace on Earth
Chrissie Blaze

Leo Tolstoy led us to believe with his great classic "War and Peace" that peace is absence of war, and that war is a natural state. We cannot blame Tolstoy, who described the human condition brilliantly, with his panoramic study of early 19th Century Russian Society. He was a storyteller who understood deeply the human condition and from his keen perception extrapolated a theory of historical determinism. Avid readers of "War and Peace" as I am (three times no less, I must confess) will see that the novel lays out a theory of history that states that there is a minimum of free choice. That war follows peace just as surely as night follows day.

In this modern age, we see little to disprove Tolstoy's awesome theories. If we look at our world in one way we see apparently inevitable results. We constantly hear about warfare, starvation, loss and tragedy and if we don't watch ourselves we allow fear to enter into our consciousness. Once fear is there, we are well on the way to proving Tolstoy's theory of life, with all its inevitability and limitation.

All it takes though is a trip to the ocean with our three-year old to know he's wrong on this. We can walk in the countryside when the dew is still sparkling on the grass and know there's nothing inevitable about life. We catch our hearts opening up, and our bodies overreacting with a feeling of tingly joy, when a charming elderly lady offers us a gentle, knowing smile, for no reason, other than love.

All it takes is to open a magazine or book, dedicated to spiritual truth and see the possibilities, reminding us never to be limited. Never to underestimate our divine potential. Never to fear our greatness or capacity to love. Never to hold a lesser picture of ourselves or our world than that offered to us by the Wise Ones. Jesus, the Lord Buddha, Gandhi, and others, graced our world at different times in our history, have offered us a path away from the endless cycle or war and limitation.

In our dim and distant path, we, the human race, may chosen the apparent delights of freewill and the right to act and be exactly as we wish. However, the goal, the Holy Grail of all thinking people is not freewill - but freedom. Freewill allows us to indulge our fleeting passions; freedom leads us on the higher path to unlock life's mystic secrets. Freedom from war, pain, limitation and fear is our birthright. Freedom to unlock the divine secrets of our higher nature, and to soar through the skies of our own becoming.

This freedom can be achieved through aligning our freewill - our right to choose - with the great Laws of God. The Divine Laws that teach us that the way to break through the endless, limiting cycles is to realize Oneness. It is then and only then that we will act with our God-nature and so rise above the apparently inevitable cycles we have - through past lives - created.

At the moment, Peace is on everyone's mind because there is continual talk of its opposite - war. If we change the way we perceive life - as a spiritual journey in which we unfold our Divine potential, not as a battle for survival, then peace must eventually dawn. First it must dawn in the hearts and minds of each of us, and then it must, by the Divine Law of Action and Reaction - Karma - exist upon our Earth.

We can then prove forever that war does not have to follow peace, as night follows day. Instead, conflict can be turned to spiritual action and peace, inward reflection. Both of these opposites will then meet in the fires of that great mystic force - LOVE.

STOP PRESS NEWS! One-Minute Peace Prayer Initiative. At 8:00 p.m. each day local time (or another time suitable for you) join together with other caring, compassionate humans around the world by saying a prayer for peace for one minute. To register for this Prayer Initiative, click here.







The War Prayer
by Mark Twain
It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the holy fire of patriotism; the drums were beating, the bands playing, the toy pistols popping, the bunched firecrackers hissing and sputtering; on every hand and far down the receding and fading spreads of roofs and balconies a fluttering wilderness of flags flashed in the sun; daily the young volunteers marched down the wide avenue gay and fine in their new uniforms, the proud fathers and mothers and sisters and sweethearts cheering them with voices choked with happy emotion as they swung by; nightly the packed mass meetings listened, panting, to patriot oratory which stirred the deepest deeps of their hearts and which they interrupted at briefest intervals with cyclones of applause, the tears running down their cheeks the while; in the churches the pastors preached devotion to flag and country and invoked the God of Battles, beseeching His aid in our good cause in outpouring of fervid eloquence which moved every listener. It was indeed a glad and gracious time, and the half dozen rash spirits that ventured to disapprove of the war and cast a doubt upon its righteousness straightway got such a stern and angry warning that for their personal safety's sake they quickly shrank out of sight and offended no more in that way. Sunday morning came-next day the battalions would leave for the front; the church was filled; the volunteers were there, their faces alight with material dreams-visions of a stern advance, the gathering momentum, the rushing charge, the flashing sabers, the flight of the foe, the tumult, the enveloping smoke, the fierce pursuit, the surrender!-then home from the war, bronzed heros, welcomed, adored, submerged in golden seas of glory! With the volunteers sat their dear ones, proud, happy, and envied by the neighbors and friends who had no sons and brothers to send forth to the field of honor, there to win for the flag or, failing, die the noblest of noble deaths. The service proceeded; a war chapter from the Old Testament was read; the first prayer was said; it was followed by an organ burst that shook the building, and with one impulse the house rose, with glowing eyes and beating hearts, and poured out that tremendous invocation -- "God the all-terrible! Thou who ordainest, Thunder thy clarion and lightning thy sword!" Then came the "long" prayer. None could remember the like of it for passionate pleading and moving and beautiful language. The burden of its supplication was that an ever--merciful and benignant Father of us all would watch over our noble young soldiers and aid, comfort, and encourage them in their patriotic work; bless them, shield them in His mighty hand, make them strong and confident, invincible in the bloody onset; help them to crush the foe, grant to them and to their flag and country imperishable honor and glory -An aged stranger entered and moved with slow and noiseless step up the main aisle, his eyes fixed upon the minister, his long body clothed in a robe that reached to his feet, his head bare, his white hair descending in a frothy cataract to his shoulders, his seamy face unnaturally pale, pale even to ghastliness. With all eyes following him and wondering, he made his silent way; without pausing, he ascended to the preacher's side and stood there, waiting. With shut lids the preacher, unconscious of his presence, continued his moving prayer, and at last finished it with the words, uttered in fervent appeal, "Bless our arms, grant us the victory, O Lord our God, Father and Protector of our land and flag!" The stranger touched his arm, motioned him to step aside -- which the startled minister did -- and took his place. During some moments he surveyed the spellbound audience with solemn eyes in which burned an uncanny light; then in a deep voice he said "I come from the Throne-bearing a message from Almighty God!" The words smote the house with a shock; if the stranger perceived it he gave no attention. "He has heard the prayer of His servant your shepherd and grant it if such shall be your desire after I, His messenger, shall have explained to you its import-that is to say, its full import. For it is like unto many of the prayers of men, in that it asks for more than he who utters it is aware of-except he pause and think. "God's servant and yours has prayed his prayer. Has he paused and taken thought? Is it one prayer? No, it is two- one uttered, the other not. Both have reached the ear of His Who hearth all supplications, the spoken and the unspoken. Ponder this-keep it in mind. If you beseech a blessing upon yourself, beware! lest without intent you invoke a curse upon a neighbor at the same time. If you pray for the blessing of rain upon your crop which needs it, by that act you are possibly praying for a curse upon some neighbor's crop which may not need rain and can be injured by it. "You have heard your servant's prayer-the uttered part of it. I am commissioned by God to put into words the other part of it-that part which the pastor, and also you in your hearts, fervently prayed silently. And ignorantly and unthinkingly? God grant that it was so! You heard these words: 'Grant us the victory, O Lord our God!' That is sufficient. The whole of the uttered prayer is compact into those pregnant words. Elaborations were not necessary. When you have prayed for victory you have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow victory-must follow it, cannot help but follow it. Upon the listening spirit of God the Father fell also the unspoken part of the prayer. He commandeth me to put it into words. Listen! "O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle-be Thou near them! With them, in spirit, we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring thehearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for therefuge of the grave and denied it-for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen. (After a pause) "Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak! The messenger of the Most High waits." It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because there was no sense in what he said.


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