Tag Archives: Spirituality

THE OLD STONE BUTTER CHURCH

*Note* I originally wrote this piece for the 2018 CBC Short Story Contest.

It called to me—the Old Stone Butter Church. It’ll call to you, too… if you’re ready.

The Old Stone Butter Church called from a rise, where it stands on Comiaken Hill keeping forlorn watch over Canada’s Cowichan River estuary and traditional lands of the Khowutzun First Nations People on British Columbia’s southern Vancouver Island. It’s stood fifteen decades—the Old Stone Butter Church—and it’s built to withstand fifteen more.

They handcrafted the Old Stone Butter Church with local basalt and sandstone—they being Khowutzun workers and Christian settlers paid with churned butter from the priest’s dairy herd. A half-pound of butter for a day’s laying stone. Fair trade, you could say, for those confirmed in Catholic faith and those cautiously caring their indigenous values.

It called to me on a November day when Quamichan winds blew plate-sized, golden maple leaves from soaking-wet branches, and browned evergreen needles fell from hulking firs mixed with over-protective cedars. I parked at the hill’s base along Tzouhalem Road. Step by slippery step over leaf-covered moss, I ascended the flagstone pathway, unsurely gripping the iron pipe handrail and passing a gauntlet of tree-bark faces independently judging my passage.

The Old Stone Butter Church loomed above, silhouetting what’s left of its classic cruciform architecture—masonry walls with embedded buttresses and a high-pitch, split-shake roof matching the backdrop of a gray fall sky. Its tired facade of vacant gothic window frames and a long-gone wooden front door gave a sad look compared to what was a once-thriving, nineteenth-century pretense happily beckoning parishioners within.

Outside, overgrowth of green salal and red salmonberry elbowed the church’s rock structure, inviting that sacred place back within the fold of nature’s harmony. Beyond the church, in a grassy field, a lone concrete cross marked the resting space of an elder in eternity, amid a grazing flock of wet, woolly sheep. And overhead, a ruling osprey screeched, outshouting the mass of raven and crow disciples perched below.

I stopped at the open doorway. It still called—the Old Stone Butter Church. Now louder… and longer… with its clear and definite message.

Shifting foot to foot, I surveyed the open vestibule and peered through cold, lonely dampness beyond the rotting jack arch that once welcomed worshipers to the warmth within. What is it? A move forth. What does the church want of me? With short and calculated steps, I crossed the narthex threshold and passed between the light and the dark.

I shivered, yet sweated. My sixty-year-old eyes adjusted to the dim, and they scanned the nave where bench rows once sat a gathered assembly under the pious approval of a scissor-vault ceiling. The floor—it was solid—like some form of mixed concrete pressed from the earth and emitting a gaseous odor not like old eggs but more as old soul.

Daylight shafted through openings that stained glass once filled and an oak door once barred. In ethereal twilight, I saw how a generation of vandals desecrated the old church making mockery of its teachings through graffiti sprayed in yellow and blue and red and black-upon-white with two offensive letters acting as parentheses enclosing the hallowed entrance—one a block-lettered “S” topped with a circular halo, the other a “B” crowned by devil horns.

I turned, facing the crossing leading to the apse and the altar. More graffiti defaced this sanctuary and some brute force had ripped rocks from the transcept, callously throwing them about with no regard for the past and what this sacristy symbolized.

I hear it shut—the vestibule door. It wasn’t a shove. Certainly not a slam. It was a solid and securing sound coinciding with a reassuring temperature change where the chill subsided as the light manifested from dismal dim to calming clarity. I looked back, and I watched as the circular window space above the now-present, paneled oak door turned from a clearing sky to a marvelous consecrational cross consumed with an enlightened rose-colored glow.

To my right and to my left, the gothic arches morphed into leaded stained glass windows of sun-filtered images showing Christian stories from Testaments new and old. Around me, the pews transformed, becoming clear-grained fir boards waxed to a shine with their backs holding leather-bound books filled with good words. Below, the gritty floor transpired into turquoise and lavender and emerald mosaics telling their version of millennia’s history.

And ahead, a crucifix appeared beyond the crossing, before the chancel, mounted on the east wall above the now-formed, maple-wood pulpit draped in a ruby cloth with virginal white braids. Radiant light illuminated the old rugged cross from the cedar-paneled barrel vault—the full-sized cross supporting an exquisite supernatural figure cruelly spiked through the wrists and ankles—His face a balanced chastity of agony and ecstasy, perfectly representing the sins of the incarnate here on earth and the resurrected world of salvation far beyond our prison of mortal comprehension.

Friend, it’s good to see you. It’s nice to know you care.”

The voice was around me. Not over, not under, not behind, nor ahead. It was everywhere within and without me. It was not male. It was not female. The best I can describe—a neutral voice with the feminine intelligence and majestic confidence of Meryl Streep and the beautiful baritone authority of Morgan Freeman. It was the voice of the Old Stone Butter Church.

 

“You… you called…” Humbly, I responded. I wasn’t scared nor alarmed. Not surprised or astounded. It felt natural to accept and submit, realizing some profound life change was occurring—I was entering an epiphany—and I was duty-bound to listen. “Why? Why have you called?”

Because you are ready.” The voice was matter-of-fact. Straight-to-the-point. Kind of like Spock.

“Ready for… what? I… I don’t understand.” Perplexity stifled my speech.

When the student is ready, the teacher shall appear.” The church’s voice confidently quoted a proverb. “You are ready to accomplish a task for me. I’ve called to instruct you.”

It was instinct to find the mouth—to look at the lips—that uttered my calling. I looked aside, viewing a black cast iron stove now convecting heat waves with the sensual smell of burning coal. Candle flickers accented gas lamps, allowing an ideal taste of comfort with glory. Only a parish remained to assemble, and this virtual reality of a bygone era would be consciously complete.

“How can… What can… I possibly do?”

I need your help spreading a message.” The church was clear and concise, but firm. “To connect with people like yourself who are ready to receive the message. Several messages, actually, wrapped into one.”

“I… I… I’ll do what I can.”

An apprehensive urge overwhelmed me. I’m not Catholic, not baptized or raised in the faith. And I’m not a practicing Christian, but I had an instant respect for this church’s voice. There was something here I’d missed in my life. Now, coming into a period of retirement and retrospection, it was time. Time to listen. Unconsciously, I knelt at the crossing—genuflecting, I’m told they call it—and I opened my mind.

I’ll outline my message…” The church paused, as if reflecting upon itself. “First, a bit of my background… how I came to present the physical state you walked to… how I lost tangible dignity but retained the inner strength and self-respect you see now.”

I stood, turning about and taking in a marvelous blend of tradition, order and décor. How something, someone, of such splendor could be so maliciously neglected seemed incomprehensible. And, how a bastion of civilization like a carefully crafted church could miraculously survive, despite infernal attempts to destroy it. Clearly, there was an answer in the message I was about to pass on.

I had ten years of good run.” The church mused. “My builders were mixed. Local native people and immigrant Europeans. It’s much like how the country, the continent, was civilized… if you choose to use that term. But, like all organizations, there has to be mutual respect for every culture, faith, and belief involved. That’s a grounded principle in every society, regardless if Christian based, traditional native, or any type of religion based on history, doctrine and decent human principles. That didn’t happen with me, now called the Old Stone Butter Church.”

I detected emotion. The voice reminisced as if struggling to resolve the past and conform to, yet help shape the present and future. I listened.

My decline began with a culture clash. Mistrust and suspicion. As you saw, my crafters had considerable skills and built my structure soundly with what they had. Rock. Wood. Mortar. They appointed me with handsome glass and hand-wrought iron. They built me as they saw fit, according to one-sided specifications. That was the Christian spectral view. Not the vision of spirituality from the Khowutzun people who have their own teachings to be respected.”

“What happened?” I was enthralled. “How did you fall into such shamble?”

After ten years, the division between Caucasian settlers and indigenous landowners became unbearably stressed. Intolerance, by some in my Christian congregation, of native beliefs and values… not all by any means… forced my aboriginal followers to evict the parish from their lands. Oh, there were falsehoods spread of me being haunted and possessed by dark forces, but the reason… the truth… remains as often is… cultures are ignorantly disrespectful of each other despite a clear interconnectedness, and universal value, of all humanity.”

“And?”

They stripped me of possessions… leaving me to stand bare… a witness to the world of religious strife and the resilience to represent truth for those wishing to find it. They… the Christian parishioners… took my stained glass windows, my oak doors, my pews, my altar, and my beloved crucifix away to a new location on non-native land and erected a new church to represent their clique. I remained empty… the Old Stone Butter Church… a vulnerable victim to vandals.

“This is a shameful story.” I felt a throat lump, a sense of pity, yet profound curiosity. What do you want me to do?

But, they didn’t take my spirit…

“…no…”

“… and you’re wondering what I want you to do. I need to confide before revealing my message. There is nothing holy about me. I’m just a human-built old rubble block, but I’m symbolic of a timeless truth. You don’t need me as a physical building to worship in or pray to. You can do that anywhere, and that’s what today’s masses are discovering… what they’re seeking. But most haven’t received the message, yet they’re ready. Many describe themselves as ‘Nones’. That being they don’t subscribe to any set religion.”

“Yes.”

These are the ones I want to reach. It’s not that they’re atheist or agnostic, and they’re not so indoctrinated in religious dogma that they can’t be reached. No. Most Nones are too busy with life’s concerns to stop and reflect on what’s really important… what the core truth is in mortal existence and how I… an old relic… can help them ground.”

“I follow your past. And think I understand where you’re going.” I stayed fast, waiting for revelation. “But why call on me?”

Because you are one of the most powerful people in society. Your kind has always been the most influential. The most persuasive force.”

“What? How am I powerful? I’m not an emperor, a politician… business tycoon. And I’m by no means an entertainment or religious icon.”

Remind me of what you do for a living.”

“I’m… I’m a writer. I write books. Articles. Web pages. Do op-eds for the HuffPost. Like, whatever pays the bills.”

Precisely. You’re a scribe. Scribes have always been the most powerful force in humanity. Emperors? Politicians? Tycoons? And religious icons and pop-entertainers? They come and they go and they’re at the mercy of scribes. They beg scribes for exposure… favorable, if they can get it. Otherwise, they fall at the scribes’ peril. Not at a foe’s sword but at a scribe’s quill.”

“You want me to write for you?” I wasn’t sure. “I am… honored… privileged… what is your message… how do you want my approach?”

Getting my word out has never been easier. But The church calculated. “Telling it properly is the challenge. Today, you, the scribe, have unlimited access to the masses. You have your blog and website. You have social media platforms. You have connections with mainstream media you’ve built through years of credibility as a respected scribe. People will listen to you. If you present my message in a way they understand, it will help them function in the world as productive and contributing society members. And they will spread it through word of mouth… rather, today, word of mouse.

“Word-of-mouse…”

It starts with something being in it for them… especially the vulnerable Nones who have limited grounding or conviction in conventional spiritual health and worship-prescribed happiness.”

“What should I tell them?”

Start my message by reassuring people that no religion has a monopoly on truth. But, most of the world’s religions have universal core concepts in their doctrine. Your human nature… it’s the cyclical nature of the universe… like the Khowutzen people knew and taught. You move forward from birth to death, after which you go back where you came from. It’s what you do unto, with, and for others during your earthly life now that matters. Not stocking-up self-important spirituality for some later event. As a side note, the concepts of heaven and hell are what you make for yourself while you exist here in human form.”

I nodded. There was no need for note taking.

There is no limit to your human potential, but there is a limit to the time you have in your ethereal lifespan. It’s incumbent for you to use your precious time as wisely as you can. That means enlightening… knowing… your internal world of health and welfare so you can help others to help themselves. That’s my core message… it’s your purpose. Know yourself and be healthy in yourself. Then help others to help themselves. Build your placid world not with vain material assets… ultimately, build your internal peace with placid external relationships. Doing so… you make yourself and others… happy. And you don’t need a church for that.”

The church said no more. I heard what was in it for the Nones and the Scribes. It was now time to go.

Its candles and lamps extinguished. Its coal stove went out. Its stained glass turned back to open sky, and its oak front door released. Its pews were gone as was its crucifix holding the representation of human divinity. And its smell… the smell of old soul… returned.

I left the Old Stone Butter Church with a purpose—a purpose I suppose was there all along. I’ve new-found happiness and reinvigorated spiritual health. My mission is sharing the message with those receptive to hearing timeless truth. Now, I’m at my keyboard with the power of the internet—billions of interconnected souls potentially at my reach—and I start by scribing these words:

It called to me—the Old Stone Butter Church. It’ll call to you, too… if you’re ready.

SWEAT LODGES – A PROFOUND SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE

I’ve had the honor to participate in three Carrier First Nations sweat lodge ceremonies. They were profound spiritual and cultural experiences and I’d like to share them with you.

A2Sweat lodge ceremonies have been a First Nations tradition since time immemorial and they serve all people, not just the indigenous. Sweats ceremonial clean and heal the body, both physically and mentally. They purge the mind, bring clarity, and test participant’s endurance, strength, and courage. They’re holy places where people renew deep and natural connection to the universe and the realm of spirits.

A1Though usually associated with healing, each sweat holds different purposes and each leader conducts their affairs a bit differently. One session might work out family or community problems. Another might handle addiction or other health issues. Some pass-on oral traditions through story telling.  But all ceremonies aim to purify your mind, body, spirit, heart, and mend your dis-ease – be it physical, emotional, directional, or spiritual. It’s much like a dialysis of the soul.

“Sweat lodge” essentially translates into returning to the womb and the innocence of childhood. Entering the dome-like structure and crawling its shallow, earthen pit is representative of passing the womb of Mother Earth. The lodge is dark, moist, hot, and safe. The darkness relates to human ignorance before the spiritual world and even more blindness to the physical world.

A3Extensive symbolism is practiced in sweat lodge ceremonies. It’s a place of transformation and purification through sensory deprivation, extreme heat, steam, prayers, pipes, rattles, drums, and song. Enlightenment is attained through breathing, meditating, journeying, and sharing words and song. It’s a unique and profoundly personal experience where your body is cleansed of toxins, stress is removed, and your mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual wellness are aligned.

In the purification of your spirit inside a sweat lodge, all sense of race, gender, and religion is set aside. As in the Mother’s womb and the Father’s eyes, we are all the same. We are One. Each of us has the equal ability to sit with the Creator himself.

A5The entrance to a sweat lodge faces the East and the sacred fire pit where rocks are heated in a wood fire. This has very significant spiritual value. Each new day begins in the East with the rising of Father Sun, the source of life, power, and the dawn of wisdom, while the fire heating the rocks is the undying light of the world – eternity – it’s a new spiritual beginning; a new day that’s sought in the ceremony.

Central to the sweat is the ideal of spiritual cleanliness. Many sweats start with fasting for an entire day, especially avoiding caffeine, alcohol, and other unhealthy substances. Prior to entering the lodge, participants smudge with sage, sweet-grass, or cedar smoke as a means toward ritual cleanliness.

A6Inside, participants sit in a circle around the central pit into which white-hot rocks are shoveled-in by the fire-tender. Modesty is expected, but any material objects such as jewelry, watches, or iPods are discouraged. This is a sacred place to pray, meditate, learn and heal, and that must be the focus. With the door shut and the lodge lit only by the glow of the rocks, the leader begins by pouring water from a wooden bucket onto the rocks.

A11When the steam and temperature rise so do the senses. Messages and vision from the Creator, or Infinite Intelligence if you’d like to call it that, are received through the group consciousness. One at a time, as a talking stick is passed, all inside get an opportunity to speak, to pray, and to ask for guidance and forgiveness from the Creator and the people they have hurt or who have hurt them. As they go around the circle, they tell who they are and where they are from, so the Creator, the Spirit People, and all there can acknowledge them.

A sweat is typically four sessions, called rounds or endurances, each lasting about 30 to 45 minutes. The round ends when the leader announces the opening of the door.

A8The first round is for recognition of the spirit world which resides in the black West where the sun goes down and the Creator may be asked for a “spirit guide” by some of the participants.

The second round is for recognition of courage, endurance, strength, cleanliness, and honesty, calling upon the power of the white North.

The recognition of knowledge and individual prayer symbolize the third round, praying to the direction of the daybreak star and the rising sun that we may gain wisdom and that we may follow the Red Road of the East in all our endeavors.

A13Fitting, the last round centers on the Yellow South and stands for spiritual growth and healing.

From spirit guides of  the west, from the courage, honesty, and endurance of the north, from the knowledge and wisdom obtained in the east, we continue the circle to the south from which comes all of our growth.

Respect, sincerity, humility, the ability to listen, and the need to slow down and think about what’s important in life, are the keys in growing through the sweat lodge ceremony.

ALTERED STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS

Bude Sheep StandingThirty years ago I had an out-of-body experience—an OBE. And, no, I’m not nuts. At the time, I was a Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer involved in an Emergency Response Team operation. We attempted to capture an armed and deranged bushman wanted for murder in the northern Canadian wilderness. It’s now known as The Teslin Lake Incident.

Mike Buday, my partner, and I were static—in a defensive position—camouflaged in deep snow, while a second squad drove the suspect towards us across a frozen lake. Three hundred yards away, we lost sight as Michael Oros entered the thick-timber shoreline. In less than ten minutes, Oros circled around us.

Mike & TrooperI had the eeriest sense. Then—imminent—extreme danger. I glanced over my left shoulder. Through a thick, gray wash of leafless brush I saw Oros’ face materialize forty-four yards away. I yelled “Mike! He’s right behind you!” Oros’ rifle exploded. He shot Mike Buday—my best friend and my partner—in the back of the neck, killing Mike instantly.

In the same nanosecond—my state of consciousness altered. Non-locally—I viewed the scene from outside my body as if sitting on a branch of a huge tree, watching it unfold from above. I had a complete sense of calm—like time stopped—and the world was a slow-motion picture. Frame by frame, I watched Oros work his bolt, turn, point his rifle at me, and pull his trigger.

I kept watching as the M-16 rifle in my hands rose. It rotated to my left. Beaded Oros’ face. And squeezed one round. Oros’ head vanished. I snapped back to local consciousness. That turned into terror.

photo 4 (1)The investigation determined my M-16’s returning shot hit Oros in the forehead. It terminated his existence immediately. When the bolt on Oros’ rifle was opened, the investigators found the live cartridge in Oros’ chamber had the firing pin punctured. It failed to go off. No scientific reason for the misfire has ever been determined.

Likewise, the scientific reason for my out-of-body experience has yet to be determined and I’ve spent the past three decades investigating it. And I do believe there’s a scientific explanation for it, because I’m not nuts and I know that it happened. And I refuse to write it off as “Paranormal”. 

I’m not the only one who’s experienced an OBE. Researchers claim that around ten percent of people have experienced some form of yet-to-be explained, altered state of consciousness. I think that the scientific knowledge of consciousness is an untapped frontier. Possibly it’s the next phase of human evolution. 

So what really is an OBE?

OBE5Turning to good ol’ Wikipedia, it’s a mental experience that typically involves a sensation of floating outside one’s body and, in some cases, perceiving one’s physical body from a place outside one’s body (autoscopy).

The term out-of-body experience was introduced in 1943 by George Tyrrell in his book Apparitions and was adopted by researchers as an alternative to belief-centric labels such as astral projection, soul travel, or spirit walking.

OBEs can be unintentionally induced by brain traumas, sensory deprivation, near-death experiences, extreme and immediate danger, disassociative and psychedelic drugs, dehydration, sleep, and electrical stimulation of the brain, among others. It can also be deliberately induced by some, such as Shamans.

Scientifically, how does it work?

OBE6I’ve pondered this ever since I recovered from my shock and grief of the Teslin Lake Incident. It was part healing process and part of my natural curiosity into the science of how and why things happen. I’m not sure if I have the right answer, but I pretty comfortable that OBEs are just part of our human design, just like the flight or fight response to danger. It’s also probably what’s behind the reports of ‘my life flashed before my eyes‘ from car accident victims.

All existence seems to come from a source of infinite intelligence which provides the rules for how the forces of the universe operate such as space, time, energy, matter, and intelligence (STEMI is the term – check this blog post for more).

Integral to human existence is our various levels of consciousness such as awake, asleep, and the always-operating subconscious level that keeps our heart and lungs working. But there’s clearly other states of consciousness like meditative, prayer, hyper-awareness, and the dangerous one which we’ve all experienced when driving—then realizing we don’t remember the last ten miles.

OBE7I’m not religious by definition of belonging to a dogmatic organization, but I’m definitely spiritual by way of believing there’s a reason behind universal existence that can be explained if we possess the knowledge to understand it. Somehow it seems that our various levels of human consciousness are tied into one central point in our mind. That may just be what the soul is. And our soul may be our portal to infinite intelligence.

Four years ago I took a sabbatical to research the soul – call it a soul search.

A plug for my book — No Witnesses To Nothing   I market it as a Crime Thriller, but that’s just marketing bullshit to get attention. It’s actually the story of my search for the science and spirituality behind the human soul. I just disguised it as a murder mystery so people would read it and maybe discover something in themselves.

My journey took me to sweat lodges, talks with leaders in science, teachers in spirituality, and long introspective walks with my dog. My stroll ended up at the door of a true, modern-day Shaman, actually a Sha-woman, and it was here that I opened my eyes to see what was behind my OBE.

OBE9Dr. Leslie Gray is a San Francisco based clinical therapist. I found her work on altered states of consciousness fascinating. She helped me view my OBE as a normal, human response to an extremely traumatic event.

I believe Shamanism to be a legitimate, sound, and professional scientific practice – once I was able to get that knowledge to understand it. Shamanism is the all-inclusive practice of willfully altering your state of consciousness to access knowledge from other sources of intelligence. There’s nothing new about Shamanism. It’s been around as long as the human species and it’s a natural practice of obtaining information. Some people are just better at it than others.

Here’s a quote from Dr. Gray.

OBE11“Shamanism is a method where virtually everyone can learn to “journey” to a world of non-ordinary reality for the purpose of healing themselves, or others, and increasing personal knowledge. This age-old and culturally transcendent technique lets you “leave” your physical body by wilfully altering your state of consciousness to acquire first-hand knowledge from a normally hidden universe.”

The science of how consciousness works remains to be discovered, but I’m now comfortable that my OBE during The Teslin Lake Incident was nothing paranormal.

It was a totally natural, human response that automatically altered my consciousness to a state of hyper-awareness which allowed me to respond in a life or death situation.

I’m so thankful the Creator designed me that way.