posted December 20, 2004 06:44 AM              

Down through the ages, astrologers have marked the winter solstice–about December 21–as a time when life begins to stir in the dark. It is not so much about the darkness as it is about the promise of joy, the promise that life will emerge into the light once more. December celebrations, whether we call them Solstice or Christmas or by some other name, celebrate under the light of a star/the stars. This is about a light, shining in the dark. It is about the promise of enlightenment. It is about the promise that something will emerge from the soil of Earth, or the womb of a woman, to join its light with the lights shining from above.
All too often, humanity has named the darkness evil, forgetting that all life begins in the dark of the soil, or the dark of a womb. Life is that which emerges into the light, joins with the light, becomes enlightened, and finally, carries the light. We are the light of the world. We are the place where enlightenment is born, grows to maturity, and is reborn in new forms to grow into new levels of maturity. Call that evolution, or call is personal and spiritual growth, but call it.

Many of you will celebrate the birth of one Jesus ben Joseph, the son of Mary, during the coming days. Some celebrate him as Son of God. He called himself Son of Man. We offer the suggestion that he was both, and so are you.
He also referred to himself as an Elder Brother, and it is our belief that he was this, more than anything else. For we believe that he was a prototype for the evolutionary advances of humanity during the age which he symbolized.
He was called Christ in Greek and Messiah in Hebrew. Both are titles, not names. They mean “one set apart, an anointed one.” Anointment was a ritual for marking a person as “set apart for greater service.” Kings and Priests were anointed. We believe that Jesus was anointed as The New Age Man of his day--a day when the new age was Pisces. He was a designated role model for human progress during the period of that age. He was a role model for human development during the Piscean Age.
Pisces is the sign of mastery, and Jesus was a master. More accurately, he was a Master of Consciousness. He held the equivalent of a PhD in consciousness, for his time. His star is widely believed to have been a conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn, rising just ahead of the Sun in Pisces. In the astrology of the times, any prominent light in the sky which lead the Sun up over the horizon was a herald of things to come. This herald represented an expansion of the limits of human mastery–thus a new level in human consciousness development.
Close examination of the sayings of Jesus strongly suggests a message that humanity was now authorized to begin making its own moral and political choices. He seems to have prophesied the eventual end of the priesthood and monarchy. Perhaps it was only pragmatism that turned a philosophy into a religion, and then made it a state religion. We still use the cliche, “If you can’t beat them, join them!”
Much of Jesus’ biblical history is concerned with the performance of miracles. Where he went, the sick were healed, the blind saw, the deaf heard, the crippled walked, and occasionally the dead returned to life.
Consider today. Many, once terminal, illnesses are cured. People are given back sight and hearing through new medical techniques daily. Many of the lame are healed to walk again. And yet, how often do we see the miracle in that? Today we think of it as modern medicine, but if time travel could take the same treatments back two thousand years, would they not be considered magical and miraculous.
What has really changed? Human consciousness has changed. We have expanded our basic intelligence through education. We have seen new possibilities through inspiration. We have hoped for, wished for, and desired better lives with a passion that lead to new discoveries.
Meanwhile, many promote democracy and religion is giving way to spirituality. We are rediscovering the true duality of being, as spirit invested in form. Have we not followed the same star that was seen in the East by the Magi of old, as we move forward toward yet another New Age?
And if we kneel by a symbolic manger, let us kneel to the divine spirit in every man. Let us be thankful for the intelligence and creativity which represent divinity invested in human form. Let us truly understand that Jesus ben Joseph was the first of many to recognize that we truly are the offspring of Deity.