Divine Spirit and the Web of Life

This is a very introspective essay on the Mystery of Life, and how I make sense of it. In a way, it is at the heart of this whole site and if you understand it, you probably understand a lot more about all the other pages. But if you're not into philosophy or thealogy, don't read this page. Just think of the Force, as in Star Wars, and you get the general drift.

Unity

I believe firmly in the ultimate Unity of all things. I believe that at the deepest level, everything is One. I am One with the faintest star, and with the oak tree on the Common, and with the Earth I live on.

Gaia theory has a wonderful way of explaining how all the aspects of the Planet Earth are intricately bound up with and dependent on each other, making the Earth and all that lives upon it into one living organism. I believe that that is true, but to me it goes further. Our solar system is another interdependent Unit, and so is the galaxy, and so is, ultimately, the Universe.

Quantum physics has shown that matter is just dense energy, and light is energy. Everything is made out of energy vibrating at different frequencies. Energy is the substance of all that is, and gives Life to all that is. I call that Life Force Spirit. And I believe that to some extent Spirit has a consciousness and a purpose. The purpose of Spirit, which is all that there is, is to express itself as fully as possible.

Multiple Expressions

Spirit expresses itself in an abundance of ways. If it can make a multitude of a thing, it will not stop at making one. Spirit expresses itself as thousands of galaxies, as millions of stars, as multitudes of planets, as range upon range of mountains, as billions of different life forms, as uncounted species of insects and thousands of species of tree. It expresses itself as thousands of individually different flowers on a blooming apple tree and six billion individually different humans upon the Earth. Each of these things is part of Spirt. And each of these things is called upon to be the best possible expression of itself, the best possible expression of Spirit.

For a tree or a cat or an insect it is quite simple to be the best possible expression of itself. Most life forms just are what they are and nothing stands in their way. Humans are more complex creatures. Thousands of years of culture and millions of years of genetic inheritance have made things a little different for us. Most of us don't remember we are Spirit, and have no idea of the amazing power we are called to express. Most humans won't even believe you if you tell them of their innate beauty and capacities. That is why for us becoming the best possilbe expression of Spirit is the task of a lifetime. We have to dig through a thick layer of inherited complications before we can even begin to let our innate light shine.

Spirits

Because everything is part of Divine Spirit, everything that exists also contains a fragment of Spirit. Like a fragment of a mirror is still a mirror in itself, so the fragments of Spirit are still Spirit. But we refer to them as the spirit of a plant or a stone or a place.

While most of these spirits are closely related to a material thing, some spirits have no material form at all. The most well-known of these are Gods and Goddesses. They are powerful fragments of Spirit who express the Life Force more purely than we ever could.

Each God or Goddess has his or her particular personality and energy. It is as if the glass of each of these windows has a different colour. So if we choose to work with a particular God or Goddess, or they choose us, we percieve the light of Spirit in one particular refraction. No God or Goddess known to humans can ever express all the truth of Life and Spirit.

It is the task of each of us to become clear and transparent as a window ourselves, so that we, too, can let the light shine through.

Web of Life

Because we are all One Spirit, we are all interconnected. These interconnections are like filaments in a spider's web. Everything is connected to everything else in an infinite Web of relationships.

We are all connected to and dependent on each other. There are obvious connections, like the one between me and the farmer who grew the wheat that became the bread that I eat. Or the one between me and the worm whose little tunnels air the soil of the field where that wheat grew.

But the relationships are also more subtle. I believe that our relationship with each other is also emotional and spiritual. I believe that there will be pain and emotional distress in the human community, as long as we don't acknowledge our intimate relationship with the Earth and begin to put right some of the damage we have done.

Yet on the other hand I also believe that we humans, individually, are powerless to correct that damage until we have healed from some of the damage that has been done to us. We have to heal our own pain inflicted on us by our culture or the circumstances of our lives in order to become clear, transparent enough to become a window and let the light through.

I believe that his healing can happen through a more conscious relationship with Spirit all around us and with the cycles of Naure. These cycles are made explicit on the Wheel of Life.

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