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Vessel of Light
December 20, 2020
“People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within....”
Elizabeth Kubler-Ross
To be a Spiritualist is to become aware of Natural Law, because the principles of Spiritualism are based on the natural laws of the universe - both physical laws and spiritual laws. Physical laws include the law of gravity and the law of motion/inertia (an object at rest will remain at rest; an object in motion continues in motion); spiritual laws include the law of attraction (things of a like vibration are drawn to one another) and the law of cause and effect (every action has an appropriate reaction).
To be Spiritualist, then, is to become aware of one’s connection to the earth, and of one’s relationship with the Universe. This can stretch one's thinking. For example, one may assert that the physical earth - the material world called the “real” world - is really “the dream.” And that the spiritual realm is the “real” real world - the essence, the life force that occasionally inhabits the physical, the consciousness that exists within and without the physical world.
In the physical world today (December 20, 2020), we are experiencing a change of seasons from autumn to winter. Within many spiritual traditions - even within Christian traditions that celebrate the birth of the Christ child - this time of year marks a celebration of the return of the earth to a state of light and life following the Winter Solstice.
Celebrating the return to light and life
The Winter Solstice occurs during the shortest day (or the longest night) of the year. The word solstice derives from the Latin sol (sun) and sistere (to stand still). On Winter Solstice, the path of the sun across the sky ceases to decline and the length of daylight reaches its minimum for three days, during which time the sun's path remains in the same place on the horizon. Then the sun's path begins its ascent in the sky and days grow longer.
Thus the interpretation by many cultures - and specifically Paganism - is of a sun reborn and a return to light-filled days. And therefore a celebration of life continuing. Think of a time during some Winter when the lights and heat went out in your home…. When it came back on what did you feel? Relief, for the return of warmth and light. And then more relief because you could return to life-as-you-had-come-to-know-it.
Is it any wonder, then, that the Christians would celebrate the birth of the Christ at this time of light and life returning to the earth?
So, we’re coming full circle now. Do you see how this celebration of light and life in which we are currently immersed fits into the higher plan? Bringing spirit into matter, through the birth of the Son, and through the rebirth of the sun - it sounds a lot like the birth of Jesus and birth of the Christ Light.
Now let’s turn our focus to Mary, for within the symbolism of this celebration of light, we are the mother goddess. Every one of us, male and female alike, is both divinely masculine and divinely feminine, and a common lesson we are here to learn is to balance those qualities.
For this moment, we are all going to get in touch with the sacred feminine in the form of the mother goddess. We are each of us giving birth, bringing the light within us - the light that is our spirit - into matter, into this physical world, giving the light a form. It might be helpful to imagine ourselves as vessels of light, or chalices of liquid light.
And what do chalices of liquid light “do?” Do they create light, do they manipulate light, do they use light? No. They receive light, they hold light, and they are moved to let light flow out of them. Most of these “activities” are actually “passivities,” in the most divinely feminine sense. We don’t need to “do” so much as allow things to be done; we don’t need to make things happen so much as accept what is happening.
And during this celebration of light that is the Winter Solstice, the wobble of the earth has just shifted on its axis, and the sun has stood still in the sky. And as vessels of light - as chalices of liquid light - we are about to be tilted on our own axes, so that the light can pour forth from us. There is nothing to do; simply be aware.
“And if tonight my soul may find her peace in sleep, and sink in good oblivion,And in the morning wake like a new-opened flower Then I have been dipped again in God, and new-created."
~ D.H. Lawrence