"the babe of healing..."

"I am waiting
in a silent prayer..."

A friend's recent post on Facebook reminded me of an early December night, many years ago.  It was a time when all I wanted was a baby to love, to hold, and to cherish.

I'd called a friend and mentor during one of my darkest moments. I poured out my heart's sorrow. I could actually feel the compassion that filled the pregnant silence. It was as palpable as a hand reaching through the darkness. Soon, my weeping stilled, and my breathing evened.

Then, when he knew I was ready to listen, he asked me if I was ready to give birth to the most precious babe on earth -- the babe of Christian healing. I knew he was referencing a passage by Mary Baker Eddy from an article titled, "The Cry of Christmas-tide," published in her collected Miscellaneous Writings 1883 - 1896:

"Unto us a child is born,
unto us a son is given.

"In different ages the divine idea assumes
different forms, according to humanity’s needs.
In this age it assumes, more intelligently
than ever before, the form of Christian healing.
This is the babe we are to cherish."
 

He reminded me that, more than ever before, this was the babe I needed to cherish -- not just for myself, but for the world.

Then, he gently suggested that I return to a series of twenty-four questions and answers that make up the entire curriculum for Eddy's course on Christian Science healing. Questions that are found in the chapter "Recapitulation," from her primary work, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures. Beginning on page 465 and concluding on page 497 we are given a path for seeking -- and finding -- healing. Twenty-four questions on thirty-two pages.

He told me that each December, he did this himself. He took one question per day and studied her answer. Then he pondered how he might answer that same question, based on what he had experienced as a healer throughout the year.

He assured me that these next precious days of gestation would bring forth this "babe," and I would be ready to cherish it with my whole life's purpose. These questions would prepare my heart. They were the promise of a new birth.

So, I did. And I still do. Each December 1st, I begin with the first question: "What is God?" I deeply consider Eddy's simple, cogent, complete, and profound answer.  Then I ask myself, "Based on what you have learned this year, what is God to you?" 

You see, I long to know God, myself.  

I am profoundly grateful for Mary Baker Eddy's waymarks as she chronicled her own journey towards a deeper understanding of what it means to "know the Lord." 

But I don't want to simply read her travel diary, and look at her photos -- I want to go where she has gone.  I long to feel that landscape under my feet.  To breathe that holy air.  And by revisiting those questions -- and then searching my heart for answers that ring with a true tone -- I align myself with the I AM THAT I AM.  For me, it is one of the most holy traditions of the season.

Last night, I couldn't wait to begin this year's season of expectancy, gestation, and birth. In fact, I was so eager that I rose just after midnight and took up that first question. The brevity and clarity in her answer took my breath away:

Question. — What is God?

Answer. — God is incorporeal, 
divine, supreme, infinite Mind,
Spirit, Soul, Principle,
Life, Truth, Love.
 

And as I pondered my own journey --  with that question as a spiritual waymark -- my heart opened to new views. What a revelation! Everything that I've discovered about God's allness, power, and grace this year has deepened my trust in the spiritual reality of all things.  It has informed my understanding of healing.  Over and over again, it has been my spiritual anchor in moments self-doubt and uncertainty. I wrote down my most current answers to that first question, and filled page-after-page, long into the night.

Tomorrow I will take up the second question. Then the third. And each day I will feel this babe grow stronger in me -- again.

For me, this Christmas exercise -- first practiced over 25 years ago -- was (and is) life-transforming. It has continued to renew and refresh my understanding of how to realize the healing presence of God. In fact, I find myself repeating it throughout the year.  And although I've been blessed with inestimable joy in parenting each of our children, it is this "babe of Christian healing," that has filled my heart with purpose, and brought unfathomable peace when my womb felt empty.

From experience, I know that on December 25th I will be looking into the face of this beloved babe. I will see this healing Christ in the unwavering spiritual innocence of universal humanity. This is the babe that I will hold close, and never let go of.  This is the babe that will never let go of me.

And each day as I ponder these questions I will be waiting, as Amy Grant sings in "Breath of Heaven," in a silent prayer for the birth this babe in my own heart.

For me, this is the great gift -- healing.  It is what we all seek.  To know that we are whole, well, complete in the All-in-allness of God's great love.   Or, as Mary Baker Eddy promises in "The Cry of Christmas-tide:"

"This is the babe we are to cherish.

This is the babe
that twines its loving arms
about the neck of omnipotence,
and calls forth infinite care
from His loving heart."
 

offered with Love,

Kate

"And she brought forth..."

"Now I'm not one to second guess
what angels have to say,
but this is such a strange way
to save the world..."

Once again, a friend's sharing of a video gave birth to this post on a night when I didn't know what He wanted me to write about...thank you. 

"A Strange Way to Save the World," by Michael Card is the perfect soundtrack for the space my heart has been in since last night's candlelight service at our sweet little storefront church. 

The readings from Scripture -- and from the writings of Mary Baker Eddy, were all based on the timelessness of the Christmas story.  And were sparked by the realization that the phrase "brought forth" also means (according to Webster) "to attract; to draw towards oneself" as in "to bring forward, to accept".  For me, this definition has given new life to such familiar, and much loved, statements like:

"And the earth brought forth...."  [Genesis]

"And she [Mary] brought forth her first born son..."  [Luke]

"The illumination of Mary's spiritual sense put to silence material law and its order of generation, and brought forth her child by the revelation of Truth, demonstrating God as the Father of men."  [Science and Health]


"Soul is the divine Mind, - for Soul cannot be formed or brought forth by human thought, - and must proceed from God; hence it must be sinless, and destitute of self-created or derived capacity to sin."  [Miscellaneous Writings]

For me, it makes conception, gestation, and birth one fluid, beautiful motion.  A graceful acceptance of the spiritual substance of those things that are flowing/radiating from God within us, the cherishing of them within our heart, and then an immediate flowing outward of their coincidental form, beauty, outline, and purpose.  It is a divinely choreographed movement that reminds me of a river's flow from it's Source, eddying for the briefest of moments within the crook of the river's womb, yet continuing to flow towards the broader waters of the sea.


But I digress...back to our candlelight service.   

As I sat there, I couldn't help but think of these images.  And after the readings were shared, we prayed in silence, and a hymn was sung, the meeting was opened for testimonies of healing and inspiration.

There were so many lovely thoughts "brought forth."  But it was during my friend, Amanda's, remarks that something broke open inside of me about this beautiful and timeless Christmas story. 

Amanda was saying that she had been led to cherish the concept of "expectation" and "expectancy" all that day, asking herself questions like, "What am I expecting?" and "How large is my expectation of God's love and care?"

As she was speaking, so earnestly from the heart, I heard the question - within me, "Do you remember when you were an expectant mother?   Well, think of it...you weren't empty, waiting to be filled, but right in that time of "expectancy" you were already full. You were cherishing what was already alive and growing within you...you were pregnant with the promise and its fulfillment."  

I could see that the time in my tummy, was only an eddying, not a creating or a waiting to be.   The waters of my child's true substance were always flowing from their divine Source, and were continuing to flow freely forward towards the broader ocean of God's purpose for her.  She was never "mine."  I could never contain her, any more that the river is being contained while it eddies in a lovely cove or inlet along its course. 

It was like a light turning on in my soul. 

I could suddenly see that when we are led to cherish an expectation...it is not in anticipation of its possible fulfillment, but the celebration of what already is present and living in, and around, and through us.

I love thinking of expectant father, Joseph, as the humble receptacle of a divine covenant.  Much the way a riverbed holds the waters of the river.  While at the same time, those same waters gently carve out a newness to its outline.  It begs the question, what is defining the shape of the river, the earthen banks...rocks, mud, trees, or the flowing of the water...or both?  

Joseph begins our story as the perplexed, but trusting, fiance' of a young girl, and the Christ  carves out in him a timeless place in history as a fully vested father, the purest of manservants to the Lord's promised "peace on earth, good will to man." 

An obscure village, this simple carpenter, a rough hewn stable, an unmarried girl, a babe - "beloved, replete, by flesh embound"...all filled with a divine purpose. 

A strange way to save a world...maybe. 

But what is it that you are expectant with tonight?  What is it that you think can't possibly "make sense?"  What will you take into the quiet manger for a star to reveal, for wisemen to worship, for kings to bring gifts to the feet of, and for shepherds to bow before?

What will you "bring forth" from the fullness of your heart...from the quiet sanctuary of your earnest longings, already pregnant with promise...and fulfillment?

sitting with you in expectancy, and with a heart full of love on this holy night...
Kate
Kate Robertson, CS

[quotes above are from the Bible and the writings of Mary Baker Eddy]

"With a blessing in my soul..."

"I will be like Mother Mary
with a blessing in my soul,
and I will give the world my eyes
so they can see..."
-     Jason Robert Brown

Maria sent me a video clip of "Christmas Lullaby" the other day.  Watching  it brought home a Christmas question I've been walking with for the past few weeks. 

It goes something like this:

"What is it that you are "great with" today?"

It comes from a Bible verse in the book of Luke that says: 

"And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child."

I remember what it felt like to be "great with child."  I remember the sense of wonder with each tiny, fluttering butterfly kick.  I remember the expectancy, the delight, the deep cherishing of our child's identity.  I remember knowing...with my entire being...that this child was pure, holy, complete, good.  I remember feeling absolutely focused with purpose and vision.  Whether I was carrying a child under my ribs, or in my heart during an adoptive journey, the fullness of love, devotion, and clarity were the same.

So I am asking myself...moment-by-moment....what is it that you are carrying expectantly, with joy, vision, hope, and grace.  What is it you are "great with" right now. 

And since it is clear to me that my only purpose is to just show up...each and every second...completely willing to love what is in the space of "Thy will be done,"...the answers are flowing, and growing, and flowering by the moment. 

Here is just a sampling of the 'babes"  I have been pregnant, or "great with" with this week:

-  I am great with hope for humanity, our planet, all creatures.

-  I am great with "a fervent desire for growth in grace, to be expressed in patience, meekness, love, and good deeds."

-  I am great with a desire to live a love that "is impartial and universal in its adaptation and bestowals."

-  I am great with a deep hunger for questions that lead me, not to answers that are steeped in certainty, but to questions that foster compassion and understanding.

-  I am great with delight in each paradox as it unfolds new views of divinity placed, like a hidden gift, in humanity. 

-  I am great with a longing for childlike pleasures and treasures...dancing, laughing, a smooth stone, a construction paper chain, a perfect snowflake on a piece of burlap.

-  I am great with a keen awareness that kindness is the gold standard, that humility is the highest ambition, and that wholeness is the only measure of a man...every man, woman,  and child...all creatures, great and small.

-  I am great with gratitude for each moment of life...and the opportunities it affords for living love.

-  I am great with a desire to breathe out a blessing with every thought exhaled.

-  I am great with a love for silence...in the storm, and in the solace of a cloistered heart.

-  I am great with contentment...satisfied by "conscious worth"....to know the simple gifts of consciousness,  to be aware of the thoughts, questions, ideas, images of beauty...the love in my heart.

-  I am great with abandon, utter surrender...letting go of the need to become...become better, become improved, become something...and just be.

-  I am great with the abundant resources that afford me the opportunity to be generous with all that I have...humility, simplicity, creativity, modesty... and not focused on what I have-not.

-  I am great with the extravagant joy of just being good...it is enough. 

These are just of few of the babes that I have been nurturing, cherishing, and stroking my hand over, as they dance within the belly of my full heart.  These are the "spiritually mature" ideas I am loving forward into a waiting, expectant, eager family of Love.  These are the children of promise  I am holding close, while they sing to me a lullaby of peace, in the night.

Mary Baker Eddy twice quotes Shakespeare in her counsel to those who wished to grow in the graces of spirit:

"Great  not like Caesar ,
stained with blood,
But only great  as I am good."

Oh to be good.  Not great, but great with goodness.  It is enough.

all love to each of you...may you be great with, big with, pregnant with infinite blessings, and may the "babe of Christian healing" fill your life with purpose and hope....

always,
Kate
Kate Robertson, CS

[many of the quoted statements above are familiars, loved phrases and sentences from the writings of Mary Baker Eddy that have become as dear to me as most loved friends.]