Wednesday August 14, 2024
– First Quarter Moon Phase – step out, take action, breaking away, expression
– Retrogrades in 2024 –
- Pluto – May 2 – October 12
- Saturn – June 30 – November 15
- Neptune – July 2 – December 7
- Chiron – July 26 – December 29
- Mercury – August 5 – August 28
– Moon in SAGITTARIUS –
– Persiad Meteor Shower 8/11 – 8/12
– Best Days (from the Farmer’s Almanac) – Aug – 14th – Travel for Pleasure, Advertise to Sell, Castrate Farm Animals, Mow to Increase Growth, Dig Holes, Kill Plant Pests, Cut Firewood, Wash Windows, Wean, Potty Train
– Planting Calendar (from the Farmer’s Almanac) – August 13th – 14th Cut winter wood, do clearing and plowing, but no planting.
– Sabian Symbol for the Solar-Lunar Year: – 20 ARIES: a young girl feeding birds in winter
– Aspect of the Aeon Sophia: (Wisdom): – Kali – The Destroyer
– Aspect of the Aeon Thelete: (Will/Desire): Kathe, God of the South – Waves and Music
– Sabian Symbol for the Solar-Lunar Month – New Moon in LEO SUN/MOON – 13 LEO: an old sea captain rocking on the porch of his cottage (EARTH – 13 AQUARIUS: a barometer)
SUN – 23 LEO: a bareback rider in a circus displays her dangerous skill
EARTH – 23 AQUARIUS: a big bear sitting down and waving all its paws
Do You Pray?
This is a question I ponder often. I know people of many religious persuasions and faiths with a wide variety of intensity in those beliefs. Far too often, their life itself diverges from those supposed beliefs. And there is where we all get confused.
I want to delve into this question, using somewhat of the Socratic method. I will ask questions, and ask you to think about them. If you are bold enough, I ask you to answer them. Answer either publicly or privately. But consider them and consider where your own beliefs lie.
Please know. This is not to challenge your beliefs. On the contrary, it is to help understand them. So here goes?
Do you pray?
Who do you pray to?
What do you pray to?
What do you say?
Is it a conversation?
Is it a specific prayer?
Do you recite the same prayers?
Do you ask blessings at mealtimes?
Do you believe that prayers are answered?
Do you believe in the divine?
Is the divine an actual being?
Do you believe in angels?
Do you have faith?
Do you believe in magic?
Do you believe in the soul?
Do you think that animals have souls?
Do you believe in heaven?
Do you believe in hell?
Do you believe in nirvana?
Do you believe dreams are a window to a different reality?
Do you believe in an existence after death?
Does astrology affect us?
Have you ever felt that you knew someone the first time you met them?
Do you believe there is life outside of earth on other planets?
Have you experienced deja vu?
Do you believe in other dimensional life?
Do you believe in miracles?
Do you believe in ghosts?
Do you believe in reincarnation?
Do you believe your ancestors are watching you?
Do you believe in luck?
Do you believe in horoscopes?
Do you believe people have psychic powers?
Do crystals contain specific energies?
The object of these questions is to consider how much you allow yourself to believe. There is so much out there that is unexplained. As society has become “enlightened” by education and study and experience, we have explained away many beliefs people had about the universe, about disease, about things people had faith in.
What is faith?
Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. It is belief in the absence of evidence.
We question. We look for answers.
The bigger point in considering these questions is not just about what you believe. You must also consider how others believe these things. You may answer one way. Someone you know believes another. Does that make one of you right and one of you wrong?
I was drawn to these questions today after reading a meme on Facebook from CS Lewis (author of the Narnia book series). He was one who wrote a lot about faith and religion, all in the realm of his stories. He is considering miracles and faith. He questions the Natural vs the Supernatural and how we wrap our heads around it.
Does he come up with the answer to the meaning of life, the universe and everything? No. But he questions it.
Why DENYING the SUPERNATURAL REQUIRES Us To Be ABSENT-MINDED(and Why This is Not Surprising)—–
The Naturalists [i. e. those who believe there is no supernatural cause for anything] have been engaged in thinking about nature.
They have not attended to the fact that they were thinking.
The moment one attends to this it is obvious that one’s own thinking cannot be merely a natural event, and that therefore something other than Nature exists.
The supernatural is not remote and abstruse: it is a matter of daily and hourly experience, as intimate as breathing.
Denial of it depends on a certain absent-mindedness.
But this absent-mindedness is in no way surprising.
You do not need – indeed you do not wish – to be always thinking… about eyes when you are reading.
In the same way the proper procedure for all limited and particular inquiries is to ignore the fact of your own thinking, and concentrate on the object.
It is only when you stand back from particular inquiries and try to form a complete philosophy that you must take it into account.
For a complete philosophy must get in all the facts… and one of the thoughts total thought must think about is Thinking itself.
– C. S. Lewis, Miracles: a Preliminary Study