The Sacred Spirit

I am convinced that many are Christians without having heard the name "Jesus." The Christ is The Anointed One, and each of us can share in being limbs on the "Body of The Christ."

It seems that, throughout the history of humanity, humans have sought an anointed one to lead them to harmony on earth. Jesus himself said that The Holy Spirit is the spirit anointed to stay with all of humanity for all eternity, lighting the way to heavenly harmony on this earth.

To say that Jesus is the only manifestation of The Holy Spirit that was ever in human form simply doesn't make sense to me. It seems to me that since humans began scratching manifestations of The Holy Spirit into cave walls, the lesson has been clear. All nature is imbued with a certain special life-giving "Something" that has the potential to burn brightest in humans.

Jesus seems to have been anointed with an incredible amount of the Holiness which he couldn't help share with others through the celebration of his life with everyone whom he encountered. He came from a remarkable line of people who had been focused on finding and following the path to harmony on earth for centuries preceding his birth. As the seeking of The Anointed One (The Christ) was passed down from generation to generation, it became stronger and stronger in the children of the faithful. The seed and the womb that produced Jesus were especially anointed, indeed.

Jesus' Anointed Spirit drew others to him, like flies to honey. People simply want(ed) to walk in his footsteps because he brought joyful peace with his mere presence and preaching. Jesus said that, in The Fullness of The Sacred Spirit, there is no Jew or Gentile, no male nor female. He also said that he was the vine that was connected to and fed by The Sacred Spirit  that fed The Sacred Spirit to all on earth when they ate of the fruit that is nourished by the branches of The Anointed on earth. He said that those branches are the people who follow in the earthly footsteps of way to The Sacred Spirit. As was taught by Jesus' Jewish ancestors, humanity is made to be anointed with The Sacred Spirit in a special way.

We seem to instinctively honor those who walk among the vulnerable, spreading The Sacred Spirit through their presence, laying hands on lepers and  little ones alike in The Sacred Spirit's healing ministries. The problem seems to be in a form of infantile sibling rivalry, that the path simply isn't big enough for all of us. We continue to attempt to kill the roots of vines that have sprouted up in gardens other than our own, rather than attempting to graft new hybrid life onto vines that will eventually stop bearing fruit without new branches to absorb and process The Light.

When will we give up the notion that the way to new life is through destruction of old life. We seem to simply be spreading the seeds of The Unholy onto our selves and our children. All Sacred scriptures, since the beginning of humanity, seem to proclaim the old Sacred seeds will fall to the Sacred ground and transform into new Sacred energy. That which is not Sacred will self-select and destroy itself, but we must be unafraid as we hold the hands of our own children and walk in the strength of our own faith.

Religions that conquer by war will die away, if we recognize that conversion by fear is not true conversion. True faith without fear seems to come from the understanding that all Sacred Energy is eternal. When we embrace peace patiently, the Sacred Spirit that is our own anointing will, in one manifestation of life or another, experience complete harmony. All life that we touch on earth carries our Sacred seeds into another manifestation and generation.

The way of The Sacred Spirit seems to have always been that we may have to move to different, more fertile ground, to keep our family faith alive and to keep from being overrun by the weeds of The Unholy. Perhaps the problem is that we are planting too many times in soil that can no longer nourish life. All ground becomes Sacred ground if it is filled with The True Spirit of harmony on earth, as it is in heaven.

They will know we are The Anointed (Christians) by our responsible compassion for all life on this earth, and by our patience in the face of others' fears.

Queenie in the Kitchen

Gayle talked in her blog, OneBirdWatching.blogspot.com today about the biblical account of Mary and Martha. She wrote how both behaviors exist in the same body, both being important to a life of prayer and service. I really resonated to that entry after the day I had on Saturday.

I was granted the gift by my friend, Queenie, of accompanying her to the kitchen of an off-the-boat Italian woman's son's home. Saturday, we were going to learn to bake Italian cookies. Richard has already perfected the baking of Eda's best biscotti ever, so I was thrilled with the opportunity to add to our repertoire of original Italian delicacies.

Real Italians are powerfully passionate people, even about the almonds and figs for their family's favorite foods. Many people don't know this, but the Italian influence in the New Orleans area is so strong that after being here for a year you become part Italian Catholic. It's in the food, the wine, and the air. Francesca should be famous as the queen if the New Orleans Italian kitchen.

I don't know what I expected, but we arrived at Francesca's son's home and were greeted by her gentle and gentile daughter-in-law. Upon walking through the great room, we came upon a beautifully appointed open kitchen looking over a huge majestic dining room. This was the kind of table where homemade Italian food would be properly honored. We were ready to roll up our sleeves, scrub up, and begin. But wait!

Through the door at the edge of the dining room was a second kitchen. Be still my heart, a prep kitchen as well as a show kitchen in a private home. Only in the mansion where my Italian friend, Noel, works had I been exposed to such a foodie's fantasy.

The first excited utterings, in a very heavy Italian accent, had to do with not having the right size bowl and the absence of the necessary twenty eggs. Julia Child was never any more entertaining than was Francesca. There were ways to do things that were sacred, and we were in danger of committing cooking heresy. Her daughter-in-law pulled out several bowls as substitutions, "No! No! No!" in the way an only Italian grandmother can express her dismay.

This prep kitchen is bedecked with gorgeous granite counter-tops. When a suitable bowl couldn't be produced, Francesca sent her daughter-in-law out for eggs, and plop! Ten pounds of flour hit the shiny surface in one big white mound. Queenie suggested that we should be writing down the recipe. What recipe? As with all really good cooks, measurements are a matter of feel, not a matter of science. Could Michelangelo have written a recipe for painting the Sistine Chapel? The only difference is that we worship the paintings forever; we eat in mere minutes the lovingly made artworks of the great chefs.

I was amazed at the similarities in teaching cooking methods between this tiny immigrant Italian and myself. When I was a professional cooking teacher, I didn't arrive in the classroom with written directions. I appointed a student in the front row to follow along, writing down all my "guestimates" of how much of each ingredient. I volunteered to be that front-row student for Francesca. I have problems standing for long periods, so this suited me just fine.

Queenie is just learning the intricacies of the kitchen, now that she's in semi-retirement. She was greatly enthused by adding the great globs of other ingredients onto the massive mound of flour. My three-year-old sister making mud pies with me had no more glee than did Queenie. It mattered not to Francesca when the half gallon river of eggs started cascading dangerously off the mound toward Queenie's feet. Not to worry, what Queenie lacks in height, she makes up for with fast reflexes.

I was enjoying being Mary, sitting at the feet of the master (mistress?), for a change, converting her Italian- tinged directives to my own shorthand for later transcription. But with Francesca, every warm body had to get into the act. You want to eat, you cook...unless you're her sacred son, who she says with pride "doesn't know how. He asks too many questions. How much you put? I no know how much."

After incorporating all other ingredients into the dough, it was time to have lunch while the dough rested. But there was to be little rest for Francesca and Queenie. Francesca had planned a feast for us. Out of her daughter-in-law's refrigerator, she produced veal cutlets that, she explained, had been breaded by her with her own bread crumb recipe. Out of the pantry, came a quart of her should-be-famous marinara sauce, that Queenie had helped her can many months before. Out of one of her five-gallon buckets, that she had brought in when she arrived, came a plastic bag of her hand grated "stinky cheese."

While Francesca set to work frying the veal and fussing about the inadequacy of the pan, I stood by asking about ingredients and procedures.  She sincerely bemoaned her inability to teach because she couldn't say "how much." By this time, I think she was toying with being comfortable that I could translate her directions to something resembling a recipe. Maybe it was the way I handled her measuring of milk by the handful into the dough that calmed her. i sincerely answered that she was the best kind of teacher, the kind that helps you learn by assisting the artist.

She and I had seemed to bond over the understanding that flour doesn't always contain the same amount of moisture, and almonds have varying amounts of oil. I think she was willing to trust me for the moment, but the proof of my trustworthiness will probably come when her daughter attempts to use my written recipes. Queenie was set to work making salad while Francesca boiled the pasta.

Meanwhile, Francesca's son had breezed through the kitchen, kissing us all on the tops of our heads and doing a bit of fatherly flirting with his two daughters. He didn't stay for lunch, but his sister entered with her two children, a nine-year-old girl and an eighteen-month-old boy who clearly adores his Nona. But he broke Nona's heart when he took one look at lunch and started saying No! with his hands and his beautiful little-boy soprano voice. I had a son with that gleam in his eye. I don't think it was meant to be an affront to Nona's culinary talents, but that he didn't want to take time out of chasing the dog to be strapped in a chair to eat.

Francesca seemed to feel that a meal without a man at the table just wasn't worth spending time on. She insisted that her daughter get the son-in-law on the phone and "make" him come to lunch. The party was on! "Ma, don't start with me! He's got other things to do!" "What he got to do? He gotta eat."

Queenie held the salad bowl up to Francesca in the position in which the alter boys hold the vessel of hosts at communion. Francesca anointed the romaine with a few ingredients and finished off with vinegar, "Just a splash." After tossing the salad, Queenie got us to the table, with the only "man" being in a high chair, by announcing, "Manga!"

We were thoroughly enjoying the lively lunch conversation about fifty years of marriage, Italian-style, when Francesca proclaimed, "Talk is good, but we got work to do. Back to the kitchen!"

Everybody really got into the act at this point. There was to be no more division of Marys and Marthas. The fourteen-year-old genius granddaughter ran for cover. Two other nine-year-old granddaughters came in and fought to be Nona's favorite cookie makers. The daughter-in-law prepared baking pans, rotated them in the oven, removed cookies, and dusted them with powdered sugar. Queenie and Francesca worked as a small (in stature and numbers) assembly line, rolling dough and placing almond and fig fillings in the centers before covering with more dough and placing on the baking sheets. The daughter-in-law placed the pans in the oven.

Every time her daughter-in-law opened her commercial convection oven, Francesca would announce, " I love this oven, but she won't let me steal it!" Her daughter-in-law replied, without missing a beat, " I told her she could have it if she can lift it out and carry it out by herself." Francesca finally admitted that she could buy one, but she didn't want to spend a thousand dollars on one when she's ready to "retire" from cooking. I got the feeling that this same conversation transpires every time Francesca cooks in her son's home.

Francesca's daughter entered with her toddler and announced to her mother that she was leaving the active little boy with her mother, so she could go shopping. Her mother replied, quick as lightening, "I have work to do! You don't do nothing!" Queenie jumped in with, "We'll watch him. You go." Francesca's look at Queenie was pure incredulity. At this point, the daughter burst into laughter, while her mother continued fussing. "Ma! I was just kidding! I don't leave him with you went you're not making cookies; I'm not going to leave him with you now!"

Francesca was already off to the races with fussing about how her daughter wasn't getting any cookies because she didn't help make them. This led to a rollicking discussion of the favoritism shown to the son, which took us full circle back to "He don't know how!" Another conversation that has probably been circling for almost fifty years.

Francesca must have then noticed that I no doing nothing, so she set me to work rolling dough. I've never had manual dexterity, so several times she fussed about my uneven dough. I offered to let her beat me with her wooden rolling stick. She said, "I would, but I know how that hurt." Did I wonder how she'd know what a whack with a wooden stick feels like? Not in the least.

My mother and grandmothers wouldn't let me help them either because I was too messy. More than once my mother's mother threatened to hit me and my younger sister with a broom handle. And when I attempted to learn drums from a nun in high school, she ended trying to teach me after two lessons with the words, "You're a spastic." i was grateful when Francesca simply patched the bald spots in the dough.

I'm not sure if I'd gotten any cookies to take home if I hadn't gotten into the act of rolling and stuffing for a few minutes. More than likely, I would have because my man arrived to take me home and I don't think Francesca knows how to let a man leave with a token of her talents to remember her by.

It took me two days to recuperate. Welcome to the Old New Orleans Italian way. Manga!

Pre-Productive Protection

In a recent Time Magazine, an article referred to the replacement of the term, "Reproductive Rights" with the term "Reproductive Justice." We continue to relabel a movement without a clearly defined mission, hoping that all who hear will be attuned to the message. Reproductive Justice is not a women's issue; it is a children's issue, and by extension, a humanity issue.

When a very close friend whose children my husband and I assisted with parenting showed me a photo of her ten-week-old unborn grandchild, I could hardly breathe with the awe of the moment. We are already deciding who he/she looks like. My friend said the baby looked like Mr. Peanut; I insisted that the skinny legs could only come from his/her grandmother, my friend. We both loved that baby already so much that we could smell him/her. Every baby deserves this kind of community commitment.

That is the damn point, you patriarchal misogynistic jerks who think that women are walking wombs with eggs for you to fertilize with your superior seed. You have no empathy, much less real committed love, for your children or their mothers. For centuries you have acted no better than roosters in a hen house. What you don't seem to comprehend is that all but a very few male roosters are killed at birth, and only the best stock is kept to reproduce. It matters not what the birth order of the baby roosters; only one is needed to service the whole flock of females. And what a mother or grandma of baby roosters thinks is no measure of superior stock. Neither is first-born status.

DNA is now able to prove paternity ( and genetic superiority), so some of you now grudgingly support your offspring and their caretaker, but you continue to act no better than barnyard thugs. I believe it is time to let you self destruct; you are anachronisms in modern society. Dinosaur dads may have been better fathers to their offspring than are many of you. We know that one close relative of the dinosaur, the penguin, is better at parenting than many of you.

We cluck our tongues and say how awful it is what Muslims do to their women. We still have households in America who treat women no better, and it is still not against International law to use rape of women AND CHILDREN as weapons of war. THINK ABOUT THIS. We have had people calling themselves Christians for over 2000 years, and we still have no international treaty against this abomination.

I was not wanted except for the services I could render as a caretaker to children of my parents beginning when I was four and we lost our Black nanny. My eventual status in society was as a servant to the children that I bore and to their father. This began in 1955 and continued until the present, in many circles. I began publicly speaking out against this when my daughter was in danger of dying four years ago and had her own husband and daughters to minister to her in her illness. I woke up about my real role in today's world. There are some things (like cancer) from which I could not protect my own young, so I began to channel the grief that I felt into protection of the children of others.

Reproductive Justice is an attempt to make sure that every child enters into a responsible, compassionate community, committed to creating world peace for all generations of children and those yet to be conceived. We can begin by making sure those who create children without responsibility for caring for the child and others who neglect and actively abuse children (including by creating them through incest or rape) have millstones tied around their necks until they throw themselves into the sea. Meanwhile, we can allow mothers who can't commit to protecting their children, both born and unborn, to make their own decisions about whether it is better: to kill a child's body before birth or the child's soul as he/she lives without love.

Fear, Myths, and Faith

Humanity is prone to fear of the unknown. This is usually a result of poor understanding of something and inability to create an action plan for dealing with the root of our fears. Sailors were justifiably afraid of fog in the days before satellite navigation systems. They could not anticipate what lay ahead, which may lead to their demise. They created myths to give them a sense of power over the unknown. The myths were probably based on the storyteller's comfort level in having the skills to deal with whatever lay beyond the mists.

Scientists, too, make up myths, which they call theories. As theories are tested, scientists come to conclusions that help them plan progress in the physical world. When a theory is tested enough to satisfy the statistics by which scientists predict events, we think of the prevailing findings as facts. These are actually the prevailing theories that seem to be factual. Great scientists never lose their sense of wonder about the unknown. They never lose their awe in attempting answers to mysteries.

There is a huge difference between fear and awe, but our religious traditions often interchange the two concepts. The Psalms speak eloquently of awe, but much of scripture speaks in fear of that which cannot be seen or understood on a physical level. Myths are created by the storytellers to assuage their own fears and those of their communities. The only tools the tellers had were words describing what surrounded them. They used the known as metaphors for the unknown. Their fear and awe were real, but not the words that could not begin to describe, in earthly terms, Infinite Power.

When scientists began understanding the nature of the unseen power that we call energy, and ascertained that all matter is manifestations of energy, this opened a whole new way to experience Divinity. The masses of energy that we call stars can be seen with telescopes long after these stars have burned out. How is this possible? The same way that we still see the faces and hear the voices of those we love long after their bodies have died. Energy never really dies; it simply goes into other manifestations.

The concept of a Holy Spirit being part of every human may be as old as humankind. The belief that this Divine Energy is the same in The Holy Spirit and in humans was codified in the book of Genesis. Isn't it possible that, by all the names that we call god, The Big Bang is, in fact, an explosion of The Holy Spirit? Isn't it possible that this holy energy has been free for the taking ever since the beginning? Isn't it possible that free will gives us the ability to manifest as much, or as little, of this Holy Energy as we choose? Isn't it possible that peace on earth is actually achievable if each of us commits to focusing our "Force" on responsible compassion?

This concept certainly gives me a greater sense of awe that the thought of god as a jealous, vengeful, war lord creating a soldiers and a son for enforcing his bloody will. I don't need to understand it to have faith in it, but this is what I believe.

The House United Will Stand

Lunch with my friend Queenie who is in many ways part of me;
She's the kind of woman who I often wish I could be.
She funny and accomplished, loved and respected;
She's the one who notices when I need to be protected.

She used to see her self as my spiritual adviser,
But this is not the reason that I so very highly prize her.
Her spiritual advice is, to my tastes, too celebration free,
But she constantly celebrates what makes me uniquely me.

We laugh, cry, sing together, and sort of dance;
We even helped each other to find lasting romance.
We've shared our children and shared our homes,
Not caring by which of us each was "owned."

She's semi-retired and finally has the spare time
To share in the memories that invoke The Divine.
We are hoping someday to share another generation
Of her beautiful family, in mutual celebration.

There are three of us amigas on different life paths;
I, even in our youth as usual, lived mine very fast.
The experience we two who are grandmothers await
Is sharing with Queenie new innocence to celebrate.

I plan to sit in a rocker and beam as she basks
In the joy of being a trusted part of parenting tasks.
If she asks for advice, we abuellas have so much to share,
Knowing that she'll understand and honor how we care.

To help committed parents is the greatest of gifts;
We've lost the honor in availability as society shifts.
Even parenting partners sometimes need helping hands;
Consistent values is what strong family demands.

In my experience, it is true that the house divided falls.
Division of men and women, onto parenting, threw a pall.
In rural society, many share all work toward the same goal;
Pulling together on the same clear path keeps The Spirit whole.

Should all families have mission statements and job descriptions?
A goal never defined and set cannot ever come to fruition.
Marriage based on animal attraction can only become sacred
By defining our and common goals, becoming spiritually naked.

Innocent souls deserve the protection of responsible community
Patrolling the perimeter to keep our children predator free.
In this day of global values entering into our sacred homes,
We can't protect our children's souls by simply casting stones.

We must remain diligent for any signs of spiritual danger,
As were the earthly guardians of the child born in the manger.
A parent without committed partners can rarely succeed;
One parent can't have all the resources to fill all a child's need.

Blood cannot be thicker than values that are passed on;
Parents are the conduits of the gifts that The Holy Spirit spawns.
Our free wills give us the right to shun even our own parents
If they subvert the sacred mission that, in our children, we are sent.

I'll not honor an earthly father or mother teaching my children wrong;
For this I have been shunned by the religion to which I did belong.
My parents were not given birth by me, they were not my sacred duty.
That others wanted them to come first was not my responsibility.

I always knew my children were lent to me, for me to keep safe;
I always knew that my boundaries would cause them to chaff.
I knew there may come a time when they would turn away from me
As they tired of hearing about the dangers that only I could see.

I hope that I can remain, in some circles, a respected elder.
I worked for this since my daughter first cried and I held her.
Before my son was born, I knew that this was a life-long mission;
I pray I'll have new opportunity to support parental decisions.

Parenting and Peace

Some religious folk create, of their neighbors' lives, a  hell
By refusing to honor the good, in them, that dwells.
They shut out the voices of the humans closest to them,
As if only one is anointed as "God's" best friend.

Can we believe that some are meant to be better than others?
All of us share the gifts of earth as our sacred mother.
A loving parent doesn't favor the gifts of only one
While allowing all other children's' gifts to be shunned.

Somewhere along the way, humans have accepted lies
That allow us, our parent's other children, to despise.
This cannot be the purpose of the many manifestations
Of the faces of Infinite Divinity in Creation's many nations.

How can parents be happy as some of their children burn in hell?
I could not, even as a small child, on this possibility dwell.
When I was taught that my father and his sons couldn't be saved,
I willingly accepted eternal damnation beyond my grave.

They shared with me more than mothers and sisters ever would,
Without competing for which of us contained the most good.
I learned that to be a man was to accept hell as their lot,
And marry women who had mastered the virtues that they did not.

I have since come to consider hell what we do upon this earth;
I believe Divinity awaits for all of our Holy Spiritual rebirth.
I believe that there are many paths to come to final peace;
When we look to all our children, the light on the path is increased.

Every child should be born as innocent as birth trauma allows;
This should be the most sacred of our society's vows.
How do we know how we interrupt eternal peace
When we insist that our own genetics should always increase?

Perhaps we are meant to adopt all unwanted children;
They are, in Universal Energy, the children of all humans.
When we begin to lovingly parent all children of all nations,
I believe we will achieve, through peace on earth, salvation.

Lessons in Life

Sometimes we're so busy saving our own souls, we're stomping on the souls of others.
I never wanted to go to heaven without my father, sisters, and brothers.
I had been taught about what was sin and that children and men are usually grace free.
Those who scorned confession and contrition were destined for hell, you see.

We could tell who was in the state of mortal sin by who sat at Holy Communion.
This could only mean that, if they died in their sleep, God wouldn't let them come in.
We had to choose whether to expose ourselves as the sinners we were to all in church,
As between being true to ourselves or true to our faith, our consciences would lurch.

It all came to a head for me when birth control became my greatest issue.
I said good-bye forever to my beloved church, but I do still actively miss you.
I know many who believe their decisions are between them and their savior,
But I can't peacefully belong to a religion when I don't follow their rules of behavior.

When I was confirmed, I took the oath, and tried my best to follow the rules;
I didn't begin to openly rebel until I went to a Catholic High School.
The dirty old chaplain was creepy; he reminded me of one of my molesters.
All these years later, the betrayals by my church continue to deeply fester.

The priests who were in charge of saving our souls were allowed to perform
The miraculous sacraments on our behalf, without their own reform.
How can the priests who sinned against me be in control of my salvation?
The abuse of absolute authority has always been a plague upon our nation.

The mighty are exempted from laws "for the good of the institution."
The churches and our leaders have ignored the evolving constitution.
How can we achieve true democracy while we protect "those too big to fail?"
Until I die, I will continue against leadership hypocrisy to rail.

We must stop acting as sheep, fearing the wolves with the biggest teeth.
We must assert our individual powers as far as they will reach.
If each of us stands up for truth, no matter the consequences,
Perhaps all humankind will eventually come to its collective senses.

The truth is none have the right to keep The Divine or justice from me.
Because we're born with a Divine spark, these gifts are ours for free.
"Do as I say, not as I do," is the way despots enforce their rules.
Did so many leave religion because we're tired of being played for fools?

The time has come to accept that not all leadership is Divinely given,
Although this is the ideal by which a true democracy is driven.
The model of teaching and testing by rote memorization
Is outmoded and a threat to the strength of our democratic nation.


Many are secretly subverting our laws without concern for consequences.
When our leaders start leading by example, perhaps it will mend the fences.
The republic assumes that the connected few are wiser than the crowd;
Teaching discernment and cooperation will keep our democracy proud.

But how can we teach these things when so few are taught to care
About the fates of others and that all resources are to be shared?
Corporate leaders shelter themselves from personal liability.
Capitalism must be governed by those who understand history.


We must stop being fruitful by multiplying ourselves in giving birth;
Responsible justice and compassion will increase Divinity on earth.
We have other crises in our nation caused by corporate greed;
The work projects in democracies fill a real human need.

The skills acquired by young men working to rebuild our nation
Carry on until this day, as does their sense of obligation.
Community service is alive in many areas of our country
Apprenticeships are the way to teach our youth how to be.


Not all human services should be set up to create company profits;
Mutual insurances within committed communities are a better fit.
If each citizen signed a pledge to use their talents to help other citizens
Even the poorest and most vulnerable could be working, sharing friends.


Acquisition of the most of everything is not the same as honest labor;


A few families hoard the resources with which America is favored.

Over and over again we dismiss the need for governmental referees,
Pretending that our leaders are concerned about our needs.

Let us each sign up to teach our skills to the vulnerable youth;
The difficulty in reaching them is not a good excuse.
We can create protected zones in all our nations schools,
And share the skills that we have to give them life-long tools.