Mary Poppins Carpet Bag- What is a meta-for?


photo childrenanimals and color.jpg

Dear Friends,

Mary Poppins Carpet Bag was magical and could hold huge objects like street lamps, remember? For week two of Lent we offer an exercise for you to imagine that inside you lives Mary Poppins Carpet Bag and over the course of Lent you will place images, past events, memories, and objects that symbolize what have been the most sacred and meaningful aspect of your life. Be sure to pack things representing your physical, emotional, mental and spiritual, self. Reflect on what has been the most impacting places, people and experiences in your history that has empowered you to becoming who you are. These events can be negative experiences as well as positive. You are packing for the rest of your life journey and in order to be healthy and strong you must take the best parts of yourself with you, the parts you feel have most empowered you to become your highest, most sacred self.

Last month, I took my first webinar ever with the inspired David Spangler, co-director of Findhorn. David has a good sense of humor, and I asked him if I could use a certain metaphor he offered in an exercise and he said, "Yes, what is a meta-for?" Mary Poppins Carpet Bag is metaphor for the hugeness of your own soul, the shape-shifting miracles of your and every life form in a creative field of our co-creation with God. Filling your Mary Poppins Carpet Bag exercise is adapted from Spangler's Identity Pouch exercise. He writes, "These contents are important, but they do not fully define you. You can transcend them if you need to; you can change and transform because of what you are as spirit and soul, as a living identity, is larger that the contents of your mind. Like the carpet bag which Mary Poppins carried that could hold anything no matter how large, the space within you, the space of your soul and your imagination, can hold anything you put into it." Working with Subtle Energies.

I offer an example of how I have done this exercise. The collage above of photos of children holding animals comes from a catalog from Save the Children. www.savethechidren.org

I cut and gathered these magazine images and placed them in my Mary Poppins Carpet Bag. They represent my love of children, baby animals and color that are a part of my history and my spirit. Meditating on the images of these precious children and knowing they are inside my Mary Poppins Carpet Bag makes me feel ready for whatever challenges I will face. It gives me an experience of self love, confidence and empowerment. Remembering what is most sacred to you will help you decide on what you need to pack. I also placed a glass of white wine with lipstick on it to symbolize the pain of growing up in an alcoholic family. As a teenager I remember thinking I had arrived in glamorous adulthood when I noticed that my glass of wine had my own lipstick on it. This memory invites me to celebrate how far I have grown to stop putting evil "Spirits" into my body. Now I consciously feed my body and soul with loving "Spirits" like the images of happy children above. Drinking in the faces of sacred children, baby animals and colors is healthy life giving spiritual food for me. I also have packed the visions I had as a child of Mother Mary and rainbows, the birth of my two children and grandchildren, travel to holy places and holy people. I have known, people and pets I have loved, Jesus and Mary Magdalene, meaningful dreams, Archangel Gabrielle playing the trumpet and a photo of the Earth from the moon. Knowing this is securely packed inside me gives me a similar feeling of preparedness, as when I know I have packed well for a weekend trip. I have what I need for any kind of weather, any kind of places I may end up having to go, either for work or pleasure, sleeping or dancing, sunshine or below zero weather, day and night time -- I am ready. I invite you to pack all your most sacred parts for your journey inside your Mary Poppins Carpet Bag in the coming weeks of Lent. This will help provide you the soul energy you need for your journey.

The journey will be difficult, with unexpected and miraculous encounters and learning. Catastrophe is here and will keep on coming here on Planet Earth..... for all of us. You have little time left to claim your highest self, to love yourself and the God within you. We have a lot of children, animals and plants to love and save so pack well. Take herds of elephants, entire galaxies or dirty wine glasses. Size is not an issue. Deep holy meaning is the issue. To pack well, you have to know yourself.

Love always,

Bonnie

Remember we are concentrating on what's lovable about you this Lent and a spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down, right?

Please join Church for Our Common Home and pray daily during Lent before the new Easter, Earth Day for someone to donate land to Church for Our Common Home. We will build a House of Pray for the Earth and grow organic vegetables. We are open to collaboration with individuals or like minded organizations.

Easter Sunday Sunrise Service

We will have a Sunrise Worship service at Torrey Pines Beach near the main entrance on the beach. Look for our Earth flag on Easter Sunday, April 21st (no Sunday evening worship on Easter) 6:30 am.

Earth Day Dinner Dance Celebration Sunday. April 28th, at 5 pm for worship, dinner and dancing!

Call for more info (858) 248-5123.

Join us in person or remotely every Sunday 5 pm (PST) for worship and for a pot luck immediately following at the Mary Magdalene Cafe.


40 Days of Prayer

7 weeks of

Imaginal Play

till Earth Day Celebration

Sunday, April 28th

We will celebrate Earth Day the weekend after Easter on April 28th

5 pm Worship/ Dinner/ Dance celebration! Official Earth day is April 22

which is the Monday after Easter.


Giving up fear, rage and sadness for Lent, Preparing for Earth Day

Dear Friends,

painting Mother of the World.jpg

Whatever your preconception is about Lent-- Give it up for Lent. Why? Because God and a life of the spirit are NOT what you expect. So many of us have been wounded and internalize negative emotions. We do not believe we are worthy of God's love. WRONG!

God loves you, you are God's beloved. Instead of depriving yourself, I challenge you to feast on rich food of the spirit this Lent with mercy, forgiveness, love and joy! Give yourself courage to fill up the whole of fear within you. Instead of concentrating on what is wrong with you this Lent, I challenge you to celebrate everything wonderful about yourself!

  1. Today Ash Wednesday, write a list of everything you love about yourself. We are dust and to dust we will return. Time is running out. It is time to learn to love yourself before you return to the earth!

  2. Name what you are afraid of in your life currently and give yourself courage.

  3. Name what makes you angry currently. Recognize that underneath your anger and rage is hurt and fear.

  4. Name what makes you sad currently. Imagine the Mother of the World in this beautiful painting above by Nicholas Roerich. You are with her and she wraps you in love and tenderness and kisses your giant well of tears. You are not alone, she is with you. She is taking you to a beautiful garden where you are playing your favorite games together. You dance, sing, swing on the tree swing, laugh, chase and tickle one another, smell the flowers and talk to the birds and butterflies and roll in the grass and lie in one another's arms and just gaze at the sky smelling the grass. She is with you and you sleep and dream together. You are loved.

You may say, have you gone out of your mind? I want to deprive myself, and I kind of feel holy when I reflect on all my shortcomings. Isn't that right? Well, it depends. If you are a negative narcissist and have habits of thinking you are the worst person in the world, no. Preoccupation with your unworthiness is another form of self centeredness and Jesus calls us this Lent to give it up. Instead, leave the desert and follow him and his beloved Mary Magdalene into the cave of your own soul

Join Church for Our Common Home as we plan for a massive party to celebrate you and all life forms for Earth Day! Do not make a list of all the ways you are less than and haven't measured up. No this Lent, please eat all the rich chocolate cake of the spirit you can find. Fill up your emptiness with everything your soul loves to eat and remember you are God's beloved!

Just to change it up this year, follow me, Jesus, Mary Magdalene and the Mother of the World, not into any kind of desert, but into the cave of your own inner sacred soul and imagine a beautiful garden where you will take a vacation from all negative emotions. Why? Because many of us are addicted to our feelings of unworthiness and the many negative emotions that follow. My main squeeze Jesus and The Good News of the Gospel is a radical message and practice-- more radial today than it was two thousand years ago. In a nutshell it is this simple message. God loves you and wants you to be healed of your preoccupation and illusions that you are a separate small self. God is inviting you to a celebration of you and all your relations, which is of course all creatures, everywhere. It's time to heal from fear, rage and sadness. How? Well, just be reminded, feelings come and go, they, like everything else in life, are always changing. There is something the negative emotions want to shapeshift into-the potential of your own magnificence!

I invite you into the imaginal realm to play and prepare for Earth day this Lent. I will offer imaginal practices for the six weeks of Lent. The holiest day of the year in 2019 is the day we love our common home Gaia, Mother earth, The Mother of the World and that we love ourselves. By the way, NEWS FLASH God has no gender, it is all a METAPHOR. But God is like the Earth who feeds and nourishes us beyond our comprehension.

A prayer for Ash Wednesday.

Dear God of Love you who are the Mother of the World,

Help me for I am often filled with fear and rage and sadness and feel so terribly alone. Are you there? Do you love me? Is it possible for me to change and heal? I am afraid the Earth is being destroyed and me and everything I know right along with it. I am grief stricken beyond measure for I love the Earth and all her creatures. HELP ME.

Amen

Practice for Ash Wednesday.

Name what is making you fearful, rageful and sad in your life. Ask God for help in prayer today and for the next 40 days.

Meditate on the painting above and then close your eyes and imagine going to a garden with the Mother of the World or an imaginary loving Grandmother, animal or loved one. Imagine "You are with her and she wraps you in love and tenderness and kisses your giant well of tears. You are not alone, she is with you. She is taking you to a beautiful garden where you are playing your favorite games together. You dance, sing, swing on the tree swing, laugh, chase and tickle one another, smell the flowers and talk to the birds and butterflies and roll in the grass and lie in one another's arms. Gaze at the clouds that are moving in the blue sky. Smell the grass. Feel the warmth of the sun. She is with you and you sleep and dream together. You are loved."

5.Join Church for Our Common Home and pray daily for the next 40 days before the new Easter, Earth Day for someone to give us land. Please help us find a few acres of land by asking people you know with land. We will build a House of Pray for the Earth and grow organic vegetables. Perhaps we could care for elderly people who may live on the land in exchange for land? We are open to collaboration with individuals or organizations.

Easter Sunday Sunrise Service

We will have a Sunrise Worship service at Torrey Pines Beach near the main entrance on the beach. Look for our Earth flag on Easter Sunday, April 21st (no Sunday evening worship on Easter) 7 am.

Earth Day Dinner Dance Celebration Sunday. April 28th, at 5 pm for worship, dinner and dancing!

Call for more info (858) 248-5123.

Love always,

Bonnie

Join us in person or remotely every Sunday 5 pm (PST) for worship and for a pot luck immediately following. Please share this with a friend.

40 Days of Prayer

7 weeks of

Imaginal Play

till Earth Day Celebration

Sunday, April 28th

We will celebrate Earth Day the weekend after Easter on April 28th

5 pm Worship/ Dinner/ Dance celebration! Official Earth day is April 22

which is the Sunday after Easter.

photo garden.jpg
042eb28f-297b-40eb-8bfd-048b213606f6.jpg

Making Home Together" Gifts of our green hearts for Mother Earth on Valentine's Day!

photo tree huge.jpg

Dear Friends,

Today is a good day to fill our heart in our own bodies with green light from the center of the earth mixing with the light of the sun. Not sending out but rather in deep loving relationship with the earth. Green is the color in our bodies energy center or chakras in our heart area. Instead of a red valentine or heart this year imagine your heart filled with green light and love from the earth and for the earth. Instead of sending it out allow yourself to be with your green heart like a huge tree that is deeply rooted in the earth as well as reaching out toward the sun. May your heart area today radiate a vibrant green love that invites you to make yourself at home here on earth. We may often imagine her as a blue jewel, but she is also like a huge tree, for she is the tree of life where our hearts live, deep underground and reaching toward the sunlight in love.

What looks like 47,000 separate trees spread out over 106 acres in Utah are actually all offshoots from a single, massive Aspen tree root. It's known as Pando and it is believed to be the largest living organism on Earth. But scientists say that overgrazing by deer and elk is now threatening Pando's survival.


photo valentine wonder woman.jpg

"Making home together" is a beautiful turn of phrase David Spangler uses in his book, Apprenticed to Spirit. He shares that many of us may not always feel that we should be here or want to be here on earth. "Gaian consciousness is a consciousness of the earth as home. It also recognizes that the "home" we may call the sacred, the place where we feel we most belong and feel most safe and loved, isn't a place to go out from and into; it is a condition to create. It is a gift to share.......hospitality, the reaching out to welcome and embrace the other and help him or her feel at home......to give expression to the power of hospitality and the making of home together."


Please join us as we welcome you to 'Make Home Together' with us at Church for Our Common Home. This Sunday please join our Prayer and Healing Worship Service, Sunday, February 17 at 5 pm. Join us for a vegetarian potluck dinner immediately following at the Mary Magdalene Cafe. We need you as we explore this "Making Home Together" at Church for Our Common Home and share ideas on how to find land to build an ecologic artistic church to pray for the earth, grow our own organic food and to love one another in intentional intergenerational community. As elders we are called to create loving sanctuary for our children and grandchildren, for all children and grandchildren and great grandchildren for they are all our own.


Sending love always,

Bonnie

P.S. Please watch this video about Pando some call the largest living organism on earth, a tree groove in Utah with a huge root system connecting all the trees as one living organism in Utah.

More info call Bonnie (858) 248-5123


painting tree roots.jpg

Invitation to Dance with Gaia and One Billion Rising this Sunday Feb 10th 5 pm

Dear Friends,

photo painting our lady holding earth.jpg

Our Earth Mother, Gaia, was asleep to me, but now I am awakened and awake with her and it makes me want to DANCE! A wooden statue of Mother Mary came to life for me as a child in a vision. She has guided and loved me and now I am a grandmother called to protect all children and grandchildren. Now I must give up childish ways and as an adult treat her as someone with flesh and blood feelings that has given me life! She is our common Mother Earth, Gaia. As a human family we have forgotten how to be in real loving relationship with her. Now science and all the ancient wisdom traditions teach us that she is a feeling being. Our Earth Mother has been treated as if she was dead but she has come to life for many of us and our human consciousness is RISING about our ecologic crisis and creative new ways to embody an ecologic civilization. We must learn this in our own bodies. One class room for a crash course to learn embodiment is the dance floor.  It is time to celebrate and dance with her, to dance and celebrate our own bodies, to dance with one another in joy that we are still alive. One Billion of us will Rise this next week to dance with you, on you, in you, all around you. Thank you for your holy body, for our holy bodies, for all of our bodies moving and swaying in and out in miraculous relationship with one another. We will dance in the interconnected intertwining movement of love to heal you, to heal ourselves, to heal one another and every creature.

Please join us for a worship of dancing this Sunday, Feb 10th 5 pm as we dance with Gaia and One Billion Rising! Eve Ensler who wrote the brilliant play, Vagina Monologues began One Billion Rising as a global movement, to end rape and sexual violence against women. It was started in 2012 as part of the V-Day movement. The "billion" refers to the UN statistic that one in three women will be raped or beaten in her lifetime, or about one billion."1 in 3 women across the planet will be beaten or raped during her lifetime. That’s ONE BILLION WOMEN AND GIRLS. Every February, we rise – in countries across the world – to show our local communities and the world what one billion looks like and shine a light on the rampant impunity and injustice that survivors most often face. We rise through dance to express joy and community and celebrate the fact that we have not been defeated by this violence. We rise to show we are determined to create a new kind of consciousness – one where violence will be resisted until it is unthinkable." We rise dancing for dancing heals our bodies and together when we dance we are doing a prayer of movement and music for our Mother Earths body. What we have done to women's bodies we have done to the earth's body for we are one.

Join us for a vegetarian potluck dinner immediately following. We need you to continue strengthening our vision with conversation about how to find and live on gifted land, build an ecologic artistic church to pray for the earth, grow our own organic food and to love one another in intentional intergenerational community. As elders we must create loving sanctuary for our children and grandchildren and all children and grandchildren and great grandchildren for they are all our own.

Sending love always,

Bonnie

P.S. Special thanks to the artist Sherri Dimmick who gave me this painting of Our Lady dancing with Mother Earth many years ago with these words written on the back. "You are the caretaker of the generations. You are the birth giver," the sun told the woman, "You will be the carrier of this universe." Brule Sioux, Sun Creation Myth

Upcoming invitations:

Lectio Divina  and Centering Prayer Contemplation of scriptures for Sunday and Centering Prayer, an ancient Christian contemplative prayer practice, every Wednesday 10 am.

Monthly Taize Chanting service first Sunday of every month

Beach candle light worship every second Sunday at Torrey Pines State Park at 5 pm. It gets cold and dark so please dress warmly.

Prayer and Healing Service third Sunday worship at 5 pm.

Dream Circle every first and third Sunday before worship 3-5 pm.

Committee on Ministry meeting every third Sunday evening after church and pot luck

Webinar with Environmental Justice Practitioners Network co-sponsored by First UU Church and Church for Our Common Home, once a month call Jamie Long (619) 436-9435.  

New live stream worship on church web site, some Sunday’s 5 pm (PST) Churchforourcommonhome.com More info call (858) 248-5123

www.churchforourcommonhome.com

Our Common Home Counseling Center’s services: Addiction Issues, PTSD, Individual and Group Therapy, Spiritual Direction, Pastoral Counseling, Dream Honoring, Creative Art Therapies etc.

www.ourcommonhomecounselingcenter.com

You are invited to the Gaia Dance! Please bring all those who you love, human and non-human creatures for Valentines Day this year!

photo woman w lion.jpg

Please come walk the Goddess Ariadne Snake Labyrinth on New Years Eve!

Dear Friends,

painting of abryinth ariade.jpg

Please join us New Years Eve, 6-9 pm as we journey to confront our deepest fears and grief. We will ask; What needs to be slain and grieved within us in order to begin creative work in the New Year? We will ask and explore these questions in prayer, at our new Wailing Wall, as well as in walking the snake labyrinth in candle light, music and dancing, dream sharing and incubation, art making and a fire ritual. We will begin at the Wailing Wall where we will write and leave prayers to God in the tradition of the ancient Wailing Wall in Jerusalem. We will share the story of Ariadne the Greek Goddess of the labyrinth, the snake goddess, and tell her story of falling in love with the hero Theseus. Ariadne however is also a heroine in this tale for it is the two working together that enable them to conquer what has been undoable by others. She saves Theseus who has to journey into the labyrinth to slay the monster, but because of the red thread she gives him he finds his way back to her. Ariadna means 'holy one' and this Cretan Princess who was the daughter of King Minos and the daughter of the moon-goddess Pasiphae later is dumped by Theseus and then marries Dionysus. She is a goddess who does not give up no matter how difficult the life challenges she faces.

Symbolically we have inner monsters that we must symbolically slay. As we journey in and out of the labyrinth, guided by the spirit of partnership of Theseus and Ariadne, we will ask for her genius to help us find simple solutions and his courage and strength to slay our inner demons. Many Greek myths tell stories of a hero who can only triumph over challenges with the help of a woman. There is an inner partnership of the divine feminine and the divine masculine we all need in the New Year. "The harder the journey, the more and the tougher obstacles in his/her path, the more the initiate will be transformed and acquire a new self in the course of the voyage of initiation." Penguin Dictionary of Symbols, Chevailer and Gheerbrant Regardless of the personal and collective dangers we now face with climate and ecological catastrophe we must never give up and have faith that when we face the truth of present dangers we will rise to the occasion especially as we work in partnership with others.

The photo below is a statue of a woman holding two snakes from the Greek island of Crete. It is a Minoan sculpture from about 1500 BC. In Greek religion and mythology and in many ancient cultures the snake was a symbol of wisdom and fertility. Come join us in a beautiful and rich evening of wisdom. Come walk the snake labyrinth as we explore many wisdom traditions from the ancient world to find a way when there seems to be no way. No alcohol will be served and we ask for you to please bring finger foods to share. Please call with any questions.

Sending love always,

Bonnie

New Year’s Eve Dec. 31 6-9 pm no alcohol, dream sharing, dream incubation, guided mediation, fire ritual, walking the snake labyrinth, with music and candle light and NEW WAILING WALL., please bring finger foods.

Upcoming invitations:

Lectio Divina  and Centering Prayer Contemplation of scriptures for Sunday and Centering Prayer, an ancient Christian contemplative prayer practice, every Wednesday 10 am.

Monthly Taize Chanting service first Sunday of every month

Beach candle light worship every second Sunday at Torrey Pines State Park at 5 pm. It gets cold and dark so please dress warmly.

Healing Service third Sunday worship at 5 pm.

Dream Circle every first and third Sunday before worship 3-5 pm.

Committee on Ministry meeting every third Sunday evening after church and pot luck.

Webinar with Environmental Justice Practitioners Network co-sponsored by First UU Church and Church for Our Common Home, once a month call Jamie Long (619) 436-9435.  

MLK All People’s Breakfast January 21th, 9-12 noon $75 join Walt and Bonnie buy tickets www.alliancesd.org/all-peoples-celebration-sponsorship

New live stream worship on church web site, some Sunday’s 5 pm (PST) Churchforourcommonhome.com More info call (858) 248-5123

www.churchforourcommonhome.com

Our Common Home Counseling Center’s services: Addiction Issues, PTSD, Individual and Group Therapy, Spiritual Direction, Pastoral Counseling, Dream Honoring, Creative Art Therapies etc.

www.ourcommonhomecounselingcenter.com

photo ariadne two snakes statue.jpg

Christmas and New Year's Blessings

Dear Friends,

xmas card for print.jpg

When I was six years old I had a vision in the underground tomb of Mother Mary, in Jerusalem at the Dormition Abbey. A dead woman came to life, a sleeping woman woke up, a wooden woman turned to flesh. This God experience has been a guiding metaphor for my life and ministry. The story of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the Black Madonna of the Americas, and the event of her asking and receiving a church built in her honor is alive, awake and real again. The divine feminine face of God is encouraging us to build her a church dedicated to the earth called, Church for Our Common Home. We ask you to help us find a donation of land to build an artist church to pray for the earth. Our Common Home Counseling Center currently funds the ministry of the church with Walt’s work as a marriage and family therapist and Bonnie’s work as a pastoral counselor and spiritual director.

Walt and I are grateful for you, our friends, colleagues and family, and we want to share the good news that this past year, we were granted a nonprofit 501C3 tax status for Our Common Home, a church and counseling center. Although we are not accustomed to asking people for money, the reality is that we depend on tax deductible donations in order to keep Church for Our Common Home alive. If you don’t have money to donate, or don’t wish to donate, we understand and ask that you hold the church in your heart and prayers. We hold you in our hearts and prayers and have enclosed an envelope for you to send us your prayer requests. Please connect us to people who you may know who have land they would like to donate and or individuals and/or organization who may be interested in collaborating with us.

 Church for Our Common Home is dedicated to the Earth, the Divine Feminine and the Arts. We worship every Sunday at 5 pm, and celebrate communion with a vegetarian pot luck following worship. This last summer the Holy Spirit called us to take our worship services to the Otay Mesa Detention Center. We do this to save ourselves, for to do nothing is to be in collusion with inhumanity. For six consecutive weeks we made a powerful, prayerful protest to the separation of children from their parents at the border and the refugee crisis caused by our country. Due to the technological genius of Anna Smith, our new Director of Media Communications, we are now able to sometimes offer worship services and other programs on live stream on our church web site. We are committed to experimenting with untraditional ways of doing church and creating beloved community with all earthlings on planet earth.  

We are in the sixth extinction of life on earth, one caused by humans, and it is past time we wake up and tell the truth about the root causes of economic greed and power over violence that has caused ecologic catastrophes, wars and resulting humanitarian crisis. There are 68 million refugees, one in every one hundred people on the planet, half who are under the age of eighteen years.

Our vision includes growing our own food and particularly welcoming children and elders as we explore an intentional intergenerational community. Currently, our programs include, Centering Prayer and Lectio Divina (a Benediction reading, prayer and meditation on scripture) regular worship in nature, Taize chanting worship, Prayer and Healing Services, dream groups, newsletter articles and updates, (please sign up on the church website) book groups, and special programs like our upcoming annual alcohol free celebration on New Year’s Eve December 31, 6-9 pm with art making, dream sharing and incubation, a fire ritual, prayers for the 150-200 species of animals who go extinct every twenty four hours at our new Wailing Wall, and walking the snake labyrinth with music and candle light. This past year we participated in two non-violent civil disobedience actions and several protests and marches. A group of us went on a field trip to Salvation Mountain, three of us went to a week and a half workshop in Temecula on how to build a straw bale ecologic house/church, and we had a booth at the Parliament of World Religions in Toronto, Canada. We worked with San Diego 350.org and First UU Church of San Diego and put on an Earth Day weekend extravaganza with a program on the ‘Reunion of Science and Religion’ with the preeminent climate scientist, Dr. Ramanathan, and Dr. John B. Cobb. Jr. the environmentalist, theologian and philosopher in an intergenerational event with live music and dancing, a reception with local earth justice organizations and were gifted with the Sheikh’s vegetarian community meal or Langar. We give special thanks to Dr. Cobb who was the initial inspiration of our church and the first supporter.

Special thanks to the Unitarian Universalist community who has welcomed me back and I am enjoying serving as the Vice President of the Board of the Unitarian Universalist Society of Community Ministers. Dr. Cobb has recently invited me to write three chapters in his current book about ‘Ecologic Civilization‘ and I am honored and thrilled! Our beloved granddaughter Laina joins us sometimes for Sunday worship and it is as a grandmother that I am called to do whatever I am able to do, to create safe, sustainable and loving community for a very uncertain and dangerous future our children and grandchildren are inheriting. Young people are voicing their concerns prophetically and I invite you to be inspired by fifteen year old, Swedish climate activist, Greta Thunberg on YouTube. She and Laina give us hope for our future. Please stay in touch and send us news of what you are up to and how Church for Our Common Home can support you in the New Year.

Love and blessings always,

Sending love always,

Bonnie

Dear God, You who fill us with courage to stand up to Empire, bless our journey as we work to save our common home Mother Earth during the current sixth extinction of life on earth, the only one created by us humans. You who are the love dance between mother and child, friends and lovers, music and motion, color and light, planets and stars, egg and sperm, you who are the egg that opens graciously and loves the creative force of sperm into transformation and miraculous new life—you Holy Mama, God of Love, Spirit, you who we call by many names, we give thanks for you and the sacredness of all nature that is alive. You who are up and down, in and out and in-between, you who are amidst our interspecies web of life, we give thanks for your unspeakable beauty and vastness. We are in awe and give thanks for our part of your creation.  We come this Christmas to stand in solidarity with Jesus and the holy family, with the animals, angels, shepherds, wise men and all those who are humble, homeless, holy and vulnerable. We hear your call to live and work in solidarity for justice and love. Fill us with your love and mercy in a world filled with cruelty and lies and teach us to love our enemies. Help us for we often feel overwhelmed and afraid. Save us from our ignorance and arrogance, wake us up to the suffering of human and nonhuman animals and plants. Inspire us to stop thinking and acting small, but to use our crisis as an invitation for bold genius. We give thanks for the inspiration of the story of Christmas and the teachings of Jesus and Mary Magdalene that open our hearts.  May the Christ-Sophia child be born within us this Christmas morning. We ask you for the blessings of a pure heart. Teach us to see with our hearts in the coming New Year. Amen

Photo above under earth photo is of a human sperm cell that  measures roughly about 0.002 inches and cannot be seen with the human eye, and a human egg which is  about 30 times bigger and is about  the size of a seed that can be seen with the naked eye.

“’A myriad of sperm collaborate to place a singlesperm before the egg, which them opens –volitionally—rather than simply being battered or overwhelmed...…The egg opens to a single sperm,’    She (Nancy Denman, a research embryologist) explained,’ For almost twenty four hours there is stillness. Then all of a sudden, the egg starts vibrating violently. “Ignition!!! We all call it.”’ Then she adds parenthetically, ‘Those of us of a more religious bent might be inclined to describe it as “the descent of the Spirit.””  

Love is the Answer, What is the Questions?

by Cynthia Bourgeault.

New Year’s Eve Dec. 31 6-9 pm no alcohol, dream sharing, dream incubation, guided mediation, fire ritual, walking the snake labyrinth, with music and candle light and NEW WAILING WALL., please bring finger foods.

Upcoming invitations:

Lectio Divina  and Centering Prayer Contemplation of scriptures for Sunday and Centering Prayer, an ancient Christian contemplative prayer practice, every Wednesday 10 am.

Monthly Taize Chanting service first Sunday of every month

Beach candle light worship every second Sunday at Torrey Pines State Park at 5 pm. It gets cold and dark so please dress warmly.

Healing Service third Sunday worship at 5 pm.

Dream Circle every first and third Sunday before worship 3-5 pm.

Committee on Ministry meeting every third Sunday evening after church and pot luck.

Webinar with Environmental Justice Practitioners Network co-sponsored by First UU Church and Church for Our Common Home, once a month call Jamie Long (619) 436-9435.  

MLK All People’s Breakfast January 21th, 9-12 noon $75 join Walt and Bonnie buy tickets www.alliancesd.org/all-peoples-celebration-sponsorship

New live stream worship on church web site, some Sunday’s 5 pm (PST) Churchforourcommonhome.com More info call (858) 248-5123

www.churchforourcommonhome.com

Our Common Home Counseling Center’s services: Addiction Issues, PTSD, Individual and Group Therapy, Spiritual Direction, Pastoral Counseling, Dream Honoring, Creative Art Therapies etc.

www.ourcommonhomecounselingcenter.com

photo our lady of guadalupe.jpg