Newsletter - 20 April 2008
Our next Service will be in the Hall (and in the Hall thereafter if attendance remains high), which is good news for all those who had to stand last week. Healing begins at the back of the Hall at 6.45pm and continues until the end of the guest talk. Our healers come with a varied range of healing tools and methods from Hawaiian kahuna to reiki and spiritual healing.
My team and I are looking forward to hearing our Guest Speaker Thubten Lekshe Kunsang on 'The Spirituality of Tibetan Buddhism' Thubten is a Tibetan Buddhist nun, who hails from the Virupa Retreat Centre, and she will have many insights, I am sure, to share with us, about her path.
Our Mediums this coming service are our resident mediums, Fiona and Craig, who come with some great credentials from the Arthur Findlay College in the UK. Our Healing Meditation this week will happen just prior to the mediumship as a way to deepen and strengthen the link with Spirit.
To be announced in the next week - a date for the start of our Mediumship Training Course, which will be held on behalf of the church by our mediums, with 50% of the fee going back to the church funds. I expect the fee to be around $10 a week, which is terrific, considering our resident mediums have been internationally trained. If you have a venue or large lounge room that you would be willing to offer for this course, do let me know. This helps keeps our costs down.
Lesley, our Healing Team leader, will be running a healing circle for those who are keen to do more with their abilities, and make a difference on a service level. Do email her at lesgeoff@aapt.net.au if you would like to be part of this.
We also have wonderful connections with local celebrant, Charles Foley, who you will hear talking about the Spirituality of Grief & Bereavement in coming weeks - who is our officiant at weddings. As Pastor and head of a public church, I am permitted of course to officiate at funerals, memorial services, and at other rites of passage - and look forward to some powerful gatherings to come in 2008. During my time in the USA in the mid-90s, I was ordained as a Minister, and for me, this feels a little like coming home...
So...lots of wonderful possibilities for the church, and we appreciate you contributing your energy! Our future vision is to begin a great choir, offer daytime services, childcare services and a car-pooling service for the elderly who cannot make it to church - and I know this will unfold at its natural pace. Lots to contemplate.....
which reminds me of this article by author Susan Kramer, on the very subject of Contemplation:
When we think about something, we are contemplating. Contemplating what to do next, what would be best, what course to follow.
Contemplation is a most useful skill to develop--as we usually make the wisest choices from forethought.
Before I go to sleep each night, I spend some time reviewing what happened that day, and how I wish to proceed on the issues for the next day. Contemplation is a way to mentally houseclean the day's activities--and prepares the space in thought, for tomorrow's unseen situations.
We can also contemplate on qualities we wish to develop in ourselves. By assessing the pros and cons about a quality, we can determine if it will uplift our lives through making us a better person, Because, as we grow in consciousness, we become more conscious of the greater plan for our life in the world. We attain a more universal overview of life.
Contemplation serves as a clearing house in our mind. We bring out a situation for review, process it, and then pass it on into usefulness or discard it as unusable for us. Or maybe send it back into our memory storage to be brought forward at another time.
Contemplation also buys us time to think over and digest new ideas that may come from outside sources--other people or the media.
Contemplation gives us the time to allow a good solution to come to mind. If we are in a hurry or pressured to make a decision quickly, we might not instantly come up with the most useful answer. But if we instead say--I'll think that over and let you know later--tomorrow or next week or whatever future date we choose, then our mind will have time to digest, mull over the situation, and come up with the most workable solution.
As we contemplate we can take notes on ideas that come to mind. Writing down my ideas while contemplating helps me evaluate the best course to follow. I look over my notes and decide the pros and cons of each idea before making an important decision.
As we progress in upgrading our consciousness through sticking to the virtues and truths we have decided to follow, we will more quickly be able to make the best decision when called upon to decide spontaneously.
