Being a famous Angel must come with its share of challenges. How many strange myths have been weaved about the names of significant spiritual figures. Our approach to God begins as children, usually in humble beginnings. Within community marred by war trauma, economic limitations and social trauma, God looms above as a serene mystery. Adorned by Heaven, and with the promise of a good future in His hand, the grief of the people in our lives often provide a haunting confusion of contrasts.
As life unfolded amidst the decaying morals and emerging cultural openness of the 90s and new millennium, God was a target for my pain and seemed a distant silent observer. Small things can trigger deep emotions for a naive mind, and so a vision of life, world, family, and God is filtered through layers of immaturity and misinterpretation.
My family belonged to a faith that held Michael to be the Archangel. Through 5 meetings per week, regular all-day assemblies, and active preaching, the submission to divine hierarchy was reinforced. Between the pop culture of post-modern times, absurdity brewed into an overactive mind. In time I learned other religions hold their bond with God and angels very differently. Yet, I have seen the mystery of the details warp some people into crippling inner desperation.
In a similar way, I was seemingly raised in a way designed to lead to a certain kind of mental state. I wonder if perhaps Michael has been held in a strange way, just as we often feel to be. The world lies in the power of the ‘wicked one’, and the ‘father of lies’ they often referred to this force, as they explained it to us. Illusion, confusion, and conflict was portrayed to be their means of control. In keeping us away from a clear view, perhaps pain was leveraged to ensure we resent our allies and don’t dare to trust true help. Secret treaties may exist, yet in a void of clarity and with a mind cut by trauma, we can’t help but see things askew and judge only our own filtered impression.
In moments of laughter and shared understanding, we hold on to the hope that pain caused by confusion may be realigned. I have called out for justice at times and prayed for grace as we have tried to beat a path to balance and peace. It might be just as close to us as a clear view and an open heart, I hope. The world of this time has been one of ego, greed, and competition. This ambitious view has altered our imagined relationships with both Heaven and the Earth. As fiction illustrates the hero’s journey and the contrast between ‘good and evil’, blank spaces sometimes were cast in our imaginations as shadows of concern. In a prayer that some other level can behold truth with a dispassionate clarity, we hope the mess might be sculptured into elegance just as David was freed from the slab of stone by Michaelangelo.
Through the pain of history, and the causes for many epic tales of perseverance, may the energy be enough to support us in discovering common aims and fresh levels of evolved intent. The journey has tried to make our friends enemies, so I write this to acknowledge what many must also have seen. Perhaps falling was a dash into the past fears, yet in redemption of heart may our efforts lead to paths of satisfying new beginnings and fruitful new encounters. The ‘Course in Miracles’ challenges us to forgive, and the Bible encourages us to pray for our ‘enemies’. Likewise, the path to healing is often spoken of in terms of release and reinvention to liberate our spirits from our egos.
Seeking answers to the questions posed by the flow of our own personal journeys, we ponder the price of every day of life. In our time, we have multiple ways of seeing with new cultural achievements and technological creativity. What was once viewed as a journey of simply getting through, gradually becomes a mission of sending earnest gestures of salvation to unknown places. We give of ourselves so there may be additional means of salvation available, entrusted to the vast unknown. In our own humble efforts and personal achievements, we urge the weavers of love to perhaps find some utility in the outpouring of our genuine visions of grace and trust.
The burdens of the past we acknowledge out of respect, and we try to carry the load to see healing for those around us. The impressions can become overwhelming at times, and the moment of our focus can be strangely diverted by the conditioning cast over us that seems to work to frustrate our partial view. It can be tiring and even lead us at times to moments of existential distress. Yet, within the moments of synchronicity and beauty, our hearts are fueled to hold firm the love of truth in our hearts and in our acts of inspired generosity. Just as each day of our life is established upon a great wave of support given to us by others, we seek to gift a new energy to the waves of life that may shift the tide in our favour or even calm the waters.
Michael Nyman – Where The Bee Dances
Chopin – Nocturne Op.9 No.2
David Bowie – Life On Mars
Tristan James Johns 