Maeve—a Magdalen for Peace

Maeve (rhymes with rave) the magnificent Magdalen is back! She is ever so welcome.

The third novel of The Maeve Chronicles, Bright Dark Madonna, tells the story of the third chapter in the life of the Celtic Magdalen. It takes us through the formation and establishment of the early church, and it tells the heart-breaking (to me) story of how Mary Mags, as she is known in my house, got written out of herstory.

When I was invited to review the third installment, I decided to give myself the gift of rereading the first two: Daughter of the Shining Isles a.k.a. Magdalen Rising relates Maeve’s marvelous beginnings as the only daughter of the eight warrior/weather witches of an Otherworld Island, Tir na mBan. The Passion of Mary Magdalen delves deeply into the story of Maeve and Jesus. At the beginning of the third book, Maeve—the gentile whore/goddess/widow of Jesus—is pregnant, and none too sure of her place in Jesus’ history.

As the novel progresses, Maeve attains the age I am now, and I was fascinated by her desire for peace. Peace in herself. Peace in her relationships. Peace in her world. And, peace with her own story. Cunningham has her Maeve/Magdalen become a cave contemplative for three years, not the thirty that legend gives the Magdalene.

One of the things that each of us faces as we grow older, and hopefully wiser, is whether to let our story die with us, or to tell our story so that future generations will learn it and learn from it. This Maeve is no exception.

I think somehow that telling the story of one’s life is part of what allows us to make peace with that story—with the parts we played, the parts we didn’t, the parts others played, and those they didn’t. Storytelling is Elizabeth Cunningham’s supreme gift, and as we witness Maeve’s process with raising her daughter, and coming to terms with her true place in the story, we see a vision of a woman lost. Her post-resurrection Christ Jesus speaks to her from the inside out, “Being lost is the way, how else can you be found. How else can you find what you have lost: sheep, coins, love?”

Ah, such wisdom. Wisdom delivered via the mouths of avatars for millennia. The path, anyone’s path, is the path of becoming lost in order that one might find oneself. So to all of us who have ever felt lost, Cunningham delivers through Bright Dark Madonna the supreme advice for the spiritual life: if you feel lost, you’re doing it right. Perfectly right.

That is the lesson of the bright, dark, wild, wonderful, lost-and-found Maeve Magdalen. From Maeve’s hilarious Curriculum Vitae in “A note on reading this book Or this is not your mother’s Mary Magdalen” to the final chord which promises a fourth Maeve Chronicle (Hip! Hip! Hooray!) there is scholarship, whimsy, and delectable fiction so close to fact that it’s tempting to believe Maeve’s story wholesale.

As I wrote on beliefnet.com a few years ago, “let me just put it this way: Were I to write a novel about Mary Mags, this is one I would want to write.” Allow me to rephrase, were I to write a third novel about Mary Mags, this is one I would want to write. I can’t wait for the fourth installment.

P. S. In that same introductory note, Elizabeth Cunningham wrote: “Let your hair down (if you have any: I don’t—the real reason I am a novelist, the vicarious thrill of writing about someone with long, red hair.)” For the record, Elizabeth, I too am a novelist, and I actually have long, red hair. Reading a protagonist as compelling as your redheaded Maeve makes me especially proud to stand in that short line of recessive genes.

Innovativity

Seeds XI, 13

Seed: Innovativity

I first saw this word on an internal billboard of a company whose name is long-forgotten, a subcontractor on The Hanford Site in southeastern Washington. I tried to find the company on the Web so I Googled the word. There were over six thousand hits, but none of them were connected to that firm.

Still, the word grasped my imagination in the same way that the Disney Company’s portmanteau word Imagineering did. Disney’s word is a combination of imagination + engineering.

Innovativity is innovation + creativity.

Both are to be sought. Creativity? Of course! Innovation? Of course! I looked it up in the OED. Nothin’ doin’. What intrigues me is the order of the combination.

At this point in the history of the world, innovation has to lead creativity. In boom times, creativity for its own sake is valued; innovation, less so. Creativity has an element of play to it. Innovation seems like a more radical, bigger commitment.

The AA definition of insanity is doing the same thing in the same way over and over again and expecting a different result.

We are not insane. Bring on the innovativity!

Be joy,

Susan Corso

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

Check out the Seeds Archive for past messages of inspiration.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at susan@susancorso.com.

For spiritual nourishment, please visit my website www.susancorso.com and my blogs

Seeds for Sanctuary, God’s Dictionary,

Ode Magazine, and The Huffington Post.

Bad Publicity?

That notorious Broadway producer, David Merrick, was famous for many of his pithy sayings—a sort of Broadway Yogi Berra. My favorite is, “Darling, there’s no such thing as bad publicity except no publicity.” It may surprise you, but it was actually an interchange between the government of South Africa and the Dalai Lama that made me think of the long-dead David Merrick.

Like many of you, I’m sure, I follow the daily news headlines on my iGoogle page. This morning, a headline from the venerable New York Times caught my eye.

South Africa Bars Dalai Lama From a Peace Conference

What?! Barring the Dalai Lama from a peace conference is like barring Bambi from the forest! Impossible! Better, quoting Wally Shawn, inconceivable! Mais non, it was right there in the All-the-News-that’s-Fit-to-Print New York Times.

“JOHANNESBURG — South Africa has barred the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s spiritual leader and a Nobel Peace Prize winner, from attending a peace conference here this week that was supposed to promote the 2010 World Cup and the potential of sport to unite people across races and nations.”

I am dubious about sport uniting people across races and nations, but I do know that barring the Dalai Lama from anywhere is bad public relations. He is the face of the exiled Tibetan people. He has stood for fifty years for peaceful reconciliation between China and the people of Tibet.

“This year also marks the 50th anniversary of a failed uprising against Chinese rule that led to the Dalai Lama’s flight into exile in India. China has accused him of pursuing independence for Tibet, while he maintains that he is seeking only autonomy, not separation.”

Three South African Nobel Peace Prize Laureates, Bishop Desmond Tutu, F. W. de Klerk, and Nelson Mandela descried the choice of their own government.

The Times went on: “If South Africa’s intention in barring the Dalai Lama was to keep the attention of the world focused on the World Cup instead of Tibet, it certainly seemed to backfire.”

Enter the illustrious David Merrick.

Well, of course it backfired on those doing the rejecting. It had to. The equation is simple. Take a worldwide symbol for the cause of peaceful reconciliation in the world and tell the whole world you’re not willing to play. The Dalai Lama has been willing to play with China from the beginning. He has counseled patience, and calm negotiation since Tibet invaded China fifty years ago. There’s no such thing as bad publicity except no publicity.

The Times: “Kjetil Siem, chief executive officer of the Premier Soccer League in South Africa, which organized the peace conference, seemed taken aback on Monday by the storm of protest that had engulfed the conference. It was supposed to be a celebration of South Africa as the rainbow nation of all races united by soccer.

“Asked what he thought of the government’s decision, he said, ‘I don’t feel I’m entitled to say anything about it.’ Asked if he worried that the uproar would damage the World Cup and South Africa’s image, he replied: ‘Another dangerous question to answer. I need to be careful. There’s a lot of water going into the ocean before this is over.’”

The Dalai Lama is a wise man. His silence is electric in this situation because the actions of China in Tibet speak for themselves. Let’s bless South Africa in its fear of China’s power, bless the Dalai Lama for enduring yet one more outrage, and thank God for the publicity it’s engendering for the plight of Tibet.

Solving Social Security

Watching Bill Maher last week, I was arrested by his suggestion that those who qualify for Social Security and are well-off should not collect their government checks, but should instead let their share continue to nourish the starving Social Security system. It’s a good idea.

Social Security has become an entitlement in the United States because all employees are legally required to pay into it. I don’t think it should be.

Here’s how Wikipedia explains Social Security: “Social Security in the United States currently refers to the federal Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI) program. . . . U.S. Social Security is a social insurance program funded through dedicated payroll taxes called Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA).”

I gave up my Social Security rights years ago. Here’s why. When I was a child, my father was killed in a plane crash. Social Security checks arrived monthly for me from the time I was five until I was twenty-one. My two younger brothers received a monthly check, too. We were survivors. Those checks made my childhood a relatively financially comfortable place.

Fast forward ten years. I became a minister. Under the Internal Revenue Code, a minister may apply for exemption from Social Security Tax with the understanding that the minister will not qualify for benefits later. It’s predicated on the notion that we preachers don’t have jobs that we’ll retire from, but that we have callings which mean that we’d rather die in the pulpit than retire.

That’s not why I applied for the exemption. I applied for the exemption because I figured I already got my share of Social Security. I’m no longer entitled to it. Let someone else have the few thousands that I’ve put in over the years.

When Bill Maher made the suggestion about some of us leaving our shares in the system, as visions of that ever-running clip of Bernard B. Madoff swirled in my head, I remarked to my Beloved that Social Security is really a sort of Ponzi scheme. My partner whirled on me and pounced: You’re right!

Wikipedia explains Ponzi scheme thus: “A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that pays returns to investors from their own money or money paid by subsequent investors rather than from any actual profit earned.”

It’s not fraudulent per se, but isn’t that a pretty good description of how Social Security works?

Bill and his guests were also talking about a temporary cessation of payroll taxes which would put instant money into our pockets if we are employees. I liked this more and more. A cessation of payroll tax influx into Social Security whilst a bipartisan task force revamps it sounds commendable to me.

A client of mine just returned from a wrenching week with her nonagenarian parents who aren’t really ill, but aren’t really well either. They require 24-hour nursing care. Part of what’s going toward paying that cost is Social Security programs. I don’t begrudge them their benefits—they paid in their share—but it does make me wonder.

My client lives 2,000 miles from her parents. Two siblings live within five minutes by car. No one wants to take these national treasures into their homes. I don’t blame them—it’s close to impossible to be a fulltime caregiver.

Death and dying have become a multi-billion dollar industry because we no longer have a tradition of caring for our elderly, or letting go. My client’s parents live in a lovely assisted living community, cared for by strangers.

I can’t help but think that if we were all to return to our heritage of taking care of one another, reinforcing the proper entitlement of all beings, that Social Security might no longer be the entitlement that it’s become and then it just might be able to take care of itself.

Overcrowding

Seeds XI, 12

Seed: Overcrowding

Sue Monk Kidd has been one of my favorite spiritual authors for many years. She started out writing for Guideposts years ago, and when her journey took her from Christian preacher’s wife into an exploration of the Divine Feminine, she was able to be true to herself and follow that singularly unchristian path.

From Dance of the Dissident Daughter, her story of that path, she branched, quite naturally, into fiction writing. Her The Secret Life of Bees was an international bestseller; it came out on film this summer. The Mermaid Chair is equally wonderful.

I don’t know where I saw this quote of hers, but it touched me deeply.

The opposite of availability is not unavailability but an overcrowded heart.

Ooh, ouch. Overcrowding is mentioned as a problem in our cities and on our world, but what about our inner worlds? When our hearts are overcrowded, we feel as though we have no time, no space, no way to breathe deeply, and all three of these things are guaranteed to make us unavailable to ourselves and to those we love.

Do you have an overcrowding problem in your heart? Take half a day, go somewhere to be by yourself, and figure out what matters to you. Then gently begin to let go those overcrowders that make you unavailable.

Not only will your secret life be better, your everyday life will as well.

Be joy,

Susan Corso

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

Check out the Seeds Archive for past messages of inspiration.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at susan@susancorso.com.

For spiritual nourishment, please visit my website www.susancorso.com

and my blogs Seeds for Sanctuary, God’s Dictionary,

Ode Magazine, and The Huffington Post.

Knowing the Truth that Makes You Free

First, let’s get one thing clear. Jesus of Nazareth DID NOT say the truth will set you free. Nope, he didn’t. What he is quoted as saying in John 8:32 is: And you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free. Very different. Way different.

So the task isn’t finding the truth. It’s knowing the truth. And how do you know the truth? You sense it in your body.

We’ve all had the experience of knowing when someone is lying to us—even if we just know it unconsciously. It’s a feeling of ickiness, of something’s not right, of something off. Knowing the truth is a cellular thing.

I read a quote recently from a book called In His Name. It read:

The truth that sets you free is the truth that you are free.

And it’s up to you and only you to decide that this is the case.

A month before my friend, Heather, died, she wrote a group email to all of us about her metastatic disease. Heather was not given to capital letters in emails but that one had three all-cap words assuring us that she was taking: MY OWN PATH. It struck me then, and it strikes me now that there really is only one path anyone can take. Their own.

You are free, dear one, always free to take your own path.

I read the following paragraph by Margaret Storz in Science of Mind magazine:

“Some of the Arthurian tales have said that when the Knights of the Roundtable sought the Holy Grail, they could not follow one another’s path because it rolled up behind them as they went forward—a sweet metaphor for suggesting that we must ultimately walk our own paths and not another’s.”

How perfect. The path rolls up behind us. No one can take the path that is our own to take. That path is always to follow the truth that we know. Always, no exceptions. We feel the truth in our wise, wonderful bodies when we let ourselves feel it.

When we follow the truth, we are free.

Drag Queen Theology

I am so enjoying RuPaul’s Drag Race on Logo these days. From “Gentlemen, start your engines” all the way to the last dance on the runway. If you haven’t seen it, it’s a reality contest to name the next superstar drag queen. I’ve watched it from the get-go.

Drag queens fascinate me. These remarkable illusionists are the quintessential pros, and the nine competitors in RuPaul’s Drag Race are all superstars. I love what American drag queen RuPaul once said about drag queens, “I do not impersonate females! How many women do you know who wear seven-inch heels, four-foot wigs, and skintight dresses?” He also said, “I don’t dress like a woman; I dress like a drag queen!”

In this week’s episode, five of the nine had been eliminated. We were down to four. Bebe Zaharia Benet, Nina Flowers, Rebecca Glasscock, and Shannel. I would have been happy if one particular one was eliminated. She wasn’t, but that’s not what grabbed me by the throat and made me choke.

What grabbed me was Shannel. Shannel had enchanted me all the way along. I really, really wanted her to win. She was sweet. She wanted to give everyone the benefit of the doubt (at the beginning). She worked on her attitude all the time. Shannel is a Las Vegas showgirl drag queen, and did she demonstrate the Law of Attraction in high relief!

Each of the remaining four contestants, dressed in eveningwear in the style of a flavored Absolut vodka, was asked, “Who do you think ought to be eliminated from this competition?”

Contestants one, two and three each chose one of their competitors, but Shannel, contestant four in that particular lineup, Shannel chose … herself. I squeaked out, “Oh, Shannel! No!” as soon as she did it.

Shannel, beautiful, stunning, gorgeous Las Vegas showgirl Shannel hoisted herself on her own petard—for real. One of the sentences of toads and newts that fell from her lip-lined mouth was, “I don’t want to be here anymore.” Well, sugar Shannel, that was it! RuPaul had no choice but to eliminate you!

We’ve all read and heard about the secret of attracting what we want in our lives. Much of the time it works, but, for sure, a way to make the law of attraction work fast is through the spoken word. In the Hebrew Bible, Yahweh spoke the worlds into being.

Speech, dear one, creates.

Sometimes, instantly.

In Shannel’s case, her drag queen theological come-uppance, occurred after a lip-synched song, but come the inevitable did. It had to.

I really wanted Shannel to be the next drag queen superstar, but since she’s been eliminated, take a theological lesson from exquisite Shannel. Speak what you want, darlin’, not what you don’t want! Now and forever.

And to you, Shannel, wherever you may be, dance one for me—you’re spectacular.

Keystone

Seeds XI, 11

Seed: Keystone

A keystone is the piece of stone at the top of an architectural structure that holds the structure in place. Notably, the image that comes to mind is an arch, a threshold, a doorway, a place that allows us to pass from here to there.

It got me thinking about the possibility that each of us has an inner keystone. In my experience, it’s usually an inner intangible value that holds the structure of our own psycho-spiritual architecture in place.

If you have been reading Seeds for any length of time, you know that my inner keystone bears a peace symbol—peace is my bottomline value. I have a client whose keystone is a beating heart—his bottomline value is love. I have a dear friend whose keystone is, for now, compassion.

The word or image on your keystone may change, but the fact that you have one does not. I encourage you to sit in the quiet and attempt to discern what’s on your keystone.

In a DC comic book series, Keystone City is the home of The Flash. Wikipedia says, “Flash v.2 #188 (September 2002), the Flash constructs a bridge that connects Keystone City and Central City. ‘Forever united, and under my protection,’ as his internal monologue reads.”

No mistakes. When you are aware of your keystone, it becomes the center of your living. Look for the flash of recognition for what holds your structure together.

Be joy,

Susan Corso

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

Check out the Seeds Archive for past messages of inspiration.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at susan@susancorso.com.

For spiritual nourishment, please visit my website www.susancorso.com

and my blogs Seeds for Sanctuary, God’s Dictionary,

Ode Magazine, and The Huffington Post.

Fires, and Riots, and Looting—Oh My!

Rev. David Wilkerson of The Cross and the Switchblade fame has issued an URGENT MESSAGE of prophecy on his blog dated March 7, 2009. Oh me, oh my, it sounds like we’re in trouble! But are we? No more than we were on March 6^th, to my way of thinking.
 

I got an email this morning from a deeply spiritual friend of mine wanting to know what I thought. What I think is that his message of prophetic doom raises the singular question of the spiritual life, which is . . .

Who is your God?

“Compelled by the Holy Spirit,” Rev. Wilkerson threatens us with an “earth-shattering calamity,” especially “ten thousand fires coming to New York City.” My friend lives in the Big Apple. Wilkerson also suggests that there will be fires, and riots, and looting. He assures us that we are “under God’s wrath.”

Is your God a wrathful God? If so, then we are exactly where Rev. Wilkerson says we are. But wait, dear one. What if your God isn’t a wrathful God? What then? What if your God doesn’t punish humankind? What if your God is really, truly the God of Love? If that’s so, then we’ve got a whole ʼnother ballgame.

So, I’ll ask it again:

Who is your God?

You know, we love to quote that verse from Genesis that humanity was made in the image and likeness of God. Were we? Or have we, instead, made God in our own image and likeness? It’s a good question.

Rev. Wilkerson goes on. “God is judging the raging sins of America and the nations. He is destroying the secular foundations.”

Notice what kinds of sins those are? Raging. Who in whose image and likeness? Could the Rev. Wilkerson have an anger problem? Maybe. Do many of us? Sure. And we don’t have to project it onto Divinity, which is what I think he’s doing.

The God I know and love is a God of Knowledge and Love. Not one of wrath or punishment. Not one of riots or looting. Now, is my God a riot? Absolutely. A laugh riot—consider the anteater. Does She have all the loot? You betcha, and He lets me use it whenever I want.

Now, as for fire, fire has a mystical significance that I cannot ignore. As elements go, it is the element of spiritual transformation. Fire changes things. Do I think this means there will be “ten thousand fires” in New York City? No, unless it’s a gorgeous, magical consciousness metaphor!

What if 10,000 fires means 10,000 spiritual beings having a human experience of transformation in New York City? Yahoo! Bravi! Go, fire, go! You’ve heard of critical mass, right? Are 10,000 New Yorkers enough to create a spiritual transformation in Manhattan? I sure as heaven hope so.

It’s no mistake, dear one, that the best-known epithet for New York City is The Big Apple. The apple, remember? The forbidden fruit that Eve courageously tasted into order to bring choice to humanity. It is our choice to change, grow, transform, be healed, speak truth, love, know. It is also an option not to do these things.

Is spiritual transformation coming to our world? You got that right!

When? (which Rev. Wilkerson refuses to say) Today, now, this moment, this wonderful, precious now.

How? Through us.

Of course the foundations are being destroyed, and not just the secular ones! All foundations based on exclusion are crumbling. We are ushering in a new age of inclusion, where everyone wins, and there is peace on earth. If there are a few messes to clear up in order to get there, bring ʼem on!

Cheating Grief through Solitaire

If you are a reader of these posts, you know that a person dear to me died recently. Monday will be six weeks. Death makes life clear, but grief clouds everything. For we who are left behind, grief is part of the process of living.

I am no stranger to grief. Much of my family has died during my lifetime. I know how to do grief, but this time, I am doing something different. I’m cheating at computer solitaire.

For years I have used solitaire as a meditation, a Zen activity that keeps my conscious mind busy so that my subconscious mind can yield its secrets. It works almost every time. Here’s how I cheat. There is a function key on my PC that lets me re-deal the cards till I start with cards I like. It’s F2. I just hold it down till there are at least two aces in the starting line-up.

There is an adage about the art of living being the ability to play the cards we’re dealt. I was dealt a death, a death I didn’t want, a death in every way I tried to help prevent. I realized that I’m manipulating the cards I’m dealt on the computer. I laughed out loud in delight when I realized what I was doing. I was rewriting the cards I was dealt.

Then I got to thinking about grief in our world and the world economy came to mind. The collective consciousness of the world is in a huge grieving process over our economy. Doesn’t it make sense? We’re scrambling to place blame. We’re lamenting our choices. We’re looking a lot of places but to ourselves for explanations.

Get still for a minute, and look at your own experience of the finances of the world. Have you been pushing the envelope somewhere? Carrying a large burden of debt? Over-extending yourself for outrageous mortgage payments? Bought too much with too little meaning?

Dear one, we’re all in this mess together. Our economy is dying, and we are grieving. So, let’s grieve. Let’s grieve consciously. Let’s let our grief—for this is its purpose—cleanse our sadness, our regret, our if-onlys, our doubts, our fears, our worries.

If you’ve ever been through a personal grieving process, you know the secret of grief.

We don’t finish with grief; grief finishes with us.

No matter the missing, the longing, the possible futures that will not come to be, the inexorability of the quotidian carries on relentlessly. Fancy words, aren’t they? What they mean is: everyday life goes on, and takes over.

Eventually, we live ourselves into wholeness again. The spaces between the missing grow longer. Our loved one is still gone, but we begin to see a glimmer of how to carry on without that particular beloved.

While I’m still in the aching, missing stage of grieving my dear friend, I’m cheating at solitaire to make myself feel better. Go on, join me. It might make you feel momentarily better. Especially when you win.

The other realization that blessed me is about our economy. It has self-immolated before. It will self-immolate again. Then, like the mythical Phoenix, we, and our economy, will rise again from the ashes of our regret and grief, to live and grow anew once more.