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February 2005 |
Gurdjieff
Dominican Newsletter |
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VOLUME 13 |
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"There are two
basic duties for man in this life; one is to serve nature and the other is
to find God"
J.G.
Bennett
“ ...the inner
world cannot be reached by the personality, for personality is alien to
it. This is very hard to
accept.
It is very
hard for us to picture what we would be like without our
personality .”
J.G.Bennett, The
way to be free,
pag
101 |
www.gurdjieffdominican.com up coming event -Seminars: · Sufi Seminar - 2005- this year from May 21- May 28 · Summer Seminar Germany - 2005 For information and registration : Webmaster@gurdjieffdominican.com
READ: LENT 2005 – AT THE END OF THE MESSAGE
PLEASE VISIT:
CHRISTIANITY http://www.gurdjieffdominican.com/christianity.html
Webmaster@gurdjieffdominican.com "...only he
can cross who has some possibility of changing. This possibility
depends on desire, strong wish of a very special kind, wishing with the
essence, not with personality." Gurdjieff,
Views from the real World,
pag.239 |
LENT 2005
Jose Reyes
We
were not expecting Lent so early,
and
this year it begins on
the
9th
of February, (Ash Wednesday). These forty days are the preparation
for
Easter
Week and every year we engage as a group in several
practices
That
have become traditional with our Dominican group.
Some
of these practices are: the fast of Lent as suggested by
Beelzebub
In Chapter 42
“Beelzebub in America”,
this fast consist in abstaining from
animal
products or by products for 47 days.
The
Great Prayer at least 3 times per week. The GP is a
special
Movement
that can be considered a magical ceremony, where a group can share
and
transmit
to each other the Higher Energies of the Great Work. Each
one
of
the gestures contains meaning and this meaning becomes alive in
our
hearts
as we perform the prayer together. It is the same as Beelzebub
every
time
we read it becomes more clear.
We
also read the Gospel of Saint John and we meditate on
different
Passages
trying to link them to our own work. Every year we also try to
memorize
The
Sermon on the Mount, since we feel it contains the rules of a
spiritual
community
living together.
We
have become so involved in life that we have forgotten that our
work
Is
also called esoteric Christianity, and Christ have become only an
idea
In
our minds. As Mr. Gurdjieff said, we should not call ourselves
Christians
unless
we can do everything that is demanded of a Christian not only
in
the
mind but with the Essence also. But a person who wish to do in his
mind
everything
that is demanded of a Christian, but can not do it with
his
Essence
is only a pre Christian. But the person that can not do
with
The
mind or the Essence is considered to be Non
Christian.
“In
the past not all men were called Christians. Some members of
the
Same
family were called Christians, others pre-Christians, still others
were
called
non-Christians. So in one and the same family there could be
the
first,
the second and the third. But now all call
themselves
Christians.
It is naive, dishonest, unwise and despicable to wear this
name
Without
justification.
A
Christian is a man who is able to fulfill the
Commandments.
A
man who is able to do all that is demanded of a Christian, both
with
His
mind and his essence, is called a Christian without quotation marks.
A
Man
who, in his mind, wishes to do all that is demanded of a Christian,
but
Can
do so only with his mind and not with his essence, is
called
pre-Christian.
And
a man who can do nothing, even with his mind, is called
a
non-Christian.
Try
to understand what I wish to convey by all this. Let
your
Understanding
be deeper and broader.”
From:
Views From the Real World P. 154
The
time of lent is an open opportunity to become pre Christian and
to
Come
to the realization that we can not do without receiving help. But
most
Of
all we are able to experience how much we need each other and how
we
can
be united as one through the Love of Christ.