Blessed is the spot, and the house, and the place, and the city and the heart and the mountain, and the refuge, and the cave, and the valley, and the land, and the sea, and the island, Of God hath been made, and His praise glorified
--BAHA'U'LLAH


I joined the show (Buffalo Bill Wild West Show), because I might learn some secret about the white man, that I could help my people, somehow. I did not see anything to help my people. I could see that the white man did not care for each other, the way our people did. That they would take everything from each other, if they could. And so, there were some who had more of everything than they could use, while crowds of people had nothing at all, and maybe were starving. They had forgotten that the Earth was their mother.

--Chief Black Elk -- 1887


Accordingly, Chief Black Elk, a famous Wichasha Wakan (Medicine Man or Holy Man) of the Oglala Lakota (Sioux Nation), intimated his observations about America. More than two-hundred years later, his observations with respect to our greed and inhumanity, especially with respect to this nation's white dominated capitalist system still hold true.

Accordingly, Black Elk, a famous Chief and Medicine Man of the Oglala (Lakota) Sioux Nation, stated he joined Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show (circa 1883 -- 1916), with the intent to better understand Americans up close, especially those whites that dominated the wealth in the US. Given his deeply mindful assessment of our culture, his quote still resonates as truth more than 200 years later. Black Elk' came to understand our fixation with materialism and the greed, hypocrisy and widespread inhuman treatment this led to with respect to America's own and others around the globe.


A VISION


Our world is vibrantly alive and abundant with talent that spans such diversity of ethnicities born of struggle, trauma, love and illuminating spirituality. Despite our continual quest to surmount the malevolent clinch of the "Jekyll and Hyde Syndrome," the God Force emerges through the imagery of humankind's creative vision, giving rise to hope for our world yet. One expression of that rapturous symmetry is through the milieu of Art.


Impressions Upon Canvas


Several years ago, I visited an art exhibit featuring Native American Art at the University of California's Gorman Museum in Davis. I was particularly drawn to one painting depicting a beautiful Native American woman with white doves encircling her, as if in supplication to The Creator. The artist, a descendant of Cherokee lineage, is involved in Native American rights struggles. This served to heighten my joy, since in addition to Native American ancestry on my mother's side, I appreciate any art form that conveys both a spiritual and social message. From a spiritual perspective the woman symbolized, to me, with her bare feet standing on a dirt mound, Earth Mother. With her mournful eyes raised toward the heavens, she was imploring the Creator to change the hearts of her wayward children. With great sorrow, she yearned for her global family to treat her with reverence, surrender their enmity to one another and recognize their shared divinity and affinity with all life.


A Cradle of Grief


Unfortunately, the emergence of Native Americans (or Indigenous People, as some prefer to be called), as primary contributors to our culture is still only beginning to be recognized. Thus, I stand in silent reverence with respect to such a people for many reasons. For one, certain tribes extended refuge too many run-away slaves when there was no respite from the ravages and cruelties in the Anglo-Saxon world they were chained to. Understandably then, it was with one of the Native American tribes that my grandfather's enslaved ancestors sought refuge.

Ironically, without the intervention of Native Americans, Anglos, who lacked appropriate survival skills, would have surely perished during the birth of this nation. Then, it wasn't out of appreciation or reverence for life that 80 percent of Native Americans perished in the interest of Manifest Destiny, further justified by the notion of their savagery. Or, that, countless blacks died owning to similar logic erecting ivory towers while feeding their captors from the silver spoon of affluence
The mystical insights of Native Americans, their reverence for the planet and the beast upon it should have stood as a testament that, humans and nature can co-exist in any ecosystem in harmony and attunement to divine law. However, the way of balance was doomed, given the relentless delusion that some of God's children feel superior to others.

Subsequently, the earth was defiled; many diversified indigenous cultures were lost alongside plant and animal life that ensuing generations will never benefit from. However, because I believe the God-Light to be inherent in all people, we can choose to evolve to a higher level of consciousness globally, averting a future in which humans will be the next disappearing species. Thus, as we continue to embrace this new millennium, we will either end the proliferation of intolerance along with our other dubious agendas or realize unity in death, if not in life.



Supplication for Righteousness


As I observed the woman in the painting, her divinity and humility came through so distinctly. With hands stretched out in supplication, she prayed for her children to be freed of the madness that consumed and blocked them from a Loving Creator. She asked that commitment respond to indifference, understanding to condemnation and that foresight and honesty finally prevail in a world mired in hypocrisy, inequity and greed.

Similarly, she asked that the wages of war, which are often promoted for reasons that obscure the truth, be abandoned. She prayed for a level of global accord that supplants awareness in place of widespread ignorance and subdues the kind of arrogance that breeds enmity across the board. She asked that the hostilities from past wars finally be laid to rest in the interest of averting yet others. She then petitioned that the vehicles of commonwealth and tribal governance focus on a peaceful coexistence built upon mutual respect as a conscious choice for human survival.

Likewise, She asked that people finally acquiescence to the simple truth that many paths lead to God as opposed to the dangerous notion there is only one. She then implored that we come to understand the spiritual premise upon which all life rests that often suggests alliance is more often achieved through consensus as opposed to a dogged resolve. She cautioned that just as a thin line divides love from hate, so too does the line that forms a barrier between a nation's inclinations to stray from loosely held democratic ideals toward a dictatorship. She then begged that sovereignty be seen as both a communal right and useful tool that liberates the suppressed from the unwarranted controls of a privileged few.

Spirit Woman then petitioned that our ethnic diversity finally become a bridge to insight instead of the well-traveled road of fear and alienation that continues to block our assimilation, on every front. She prayed that religion be a means to faith instead of a widely used opiate and instrument of deceit, and that knowledge finally overcome the lethal effects of apathy and fear. She prayed that we abandon the relentless quest for material acquisition that leaves us vulnerable to the dangers of unchecked commercial manipulation. With a heavy heart, she asked that love, peace and unity, finally, become the driving force against all manner of imbalance and discord across her lands.


A Ravaged Legacy


Spirit Woman then pleaded that her rivers and lakes be purged of toxins, her forests restored to their once lush grandeur, and that the seas and oceans be made blue and abundant with life, again. She prayed that the air be cleansed and her lands freed from the ravages of relentless wars and reckless misuse. She then asked that the animals, which have come to aid and teach love, be treated with dignity as an integral link in the Comic Plan.

She called upon the Divine Elements, asking the Soil to consume the weeds borne of hatred and suspicion, and that the sacred waters wash away the wounds born out of the ignorance, corruption and oppression. She beseeched the four Winds to clear away the dust of faulty reasoning that continually clouds our vision, forming barriers to all that's good. She asked that the Sun restore God's light where darkness has blinded and withered the hearts of her children, far to long.


Spiritual Portrait


Spirit Woman, then, symbolically stands in tribute to wisdom, inner strength and nurturing. For, she is the benevolent guardian of life, appointed by the Creator, who upholds the foundation upon which humanity rests. Her spirit softens guides and fosters love, compassion and understanding to all. Balance is her anchor, discernment her compass and spiritual law her standard by which she measures all that is immutably bound to the Creator in life. As the Universal caretaker, she recognizes that life is an integration of diametrically opposed forces, the Yin and Yang, Positive and Negative, and the polar extremes of North and South. And that, through the synthesis of polarity are born the seeds of hope, enlightenment and a yearning to embrace The Infinite. In essence, Spirit Woman exemplifies the awakened divinity humankind can aspire to.

She is an inter-dimensional being endowed with the realization that we are far more than the limitations imposed by an unrestrained ego or a precarious world. Cognizant of her true nature, she resists any barrier that impedes her from the sacred covenant she shares with God, the Ascended Masters and humanity. Within her aura rests an immutable poise and durability implying great humility, inner strength and the assurance that she is directed by an All Knowing and Loving Creator.

To her, all life flows from the Celestial River, which pours forth an infinite wellspring of love, creativity and expression. Upon her head rests the gift of Spiritual Fulfillment. Permeating her heart are the heavenly ethers of Love and joy. And, upon her feet are anchored fidelity, self-assurance and a clear recognition she's grounded in an Infinitely Perfect Power. Spirit Woman is the Alchemist who teaches us how to integrate and blend life's experiences to gain mastery and transcend all manner of limitation. As the sacred vessel and co-creator of the Universe, she is also the portal through which the Ascended Masters pass to unveil the celestial splendors that await God's earthly heirs.


Ensuing Metamorphosis


Embracing the mystical imagery of the Woman is within our grasp. For, as we learn to know and manage the gift of self honorably, we will claim a positive sense of direction, achieve balance and unveil the spiritual purpose in our shared humanity. We will also see with the Inner Light of our Spirit beyond the many deceptions and distractions in the world of form, and soar with the doves (in the Portrait) to a level of spiritual consciousness that surrounds Spirit Woman, our Earth Mother. But, not until we embrace the sacred love and receptivity of the Moon (female energy) and the dynamic creativity of the Sun (male energy) to create a New World, wherein balance, peace, love and unity are poised around the globe. And so it is written.


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