Tag Archive | sermon

It’s the 2nd Friday the 13th For 2018

Jul13

Thirteen On Springwolf ReflectionsDo You Know The Origins of Friday the 13th?

Once again it’s another 13th day that lands on a Friday. Once again, news organizations are publishing articles about where the day came from and who started it. And once again, their general line is “no one knows where it started”. Yeah, um…No. What they mean is, they don’t want to look at Pagan History and find yet another thing they observe that’s based on Pagan beliefs and practices.

We know where the day came from. We know generally when it started. And we know it is NOT based in Christian lore concerning the Knights Templar.

If you’re interested in the Pagan History of this day, you’ll have to turn to indo-European pagans. And the persecution of an old peaceful religion.
History of Friday the 13th – It’s a good day for Pagans.

Artist Unknown

Oh, and I forgot. This Friday the 13th falls in the range of the New Moon celebrations. You might want to include a little Moon Magik in your celebrations. This holiday for Pagans is all about good luck and receiving blessings from the Divine (who or whatever that is to you). The New Moon phase is best used for personal growth, healing and blessing of new projects or ventures. A great time to share that energy with the good luck of the 13th. It’s also a good time to cleanse and consecrate new tools and objects you wish to use during rituals, ceremonies or an up coming festival.

May you all have a blessed and wonderful day.

 

 

 

© Springwolfs Hanko

© 2018 Springwolf, D.D., Ph.D. Springwolf Reflections / Springs Haven, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

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Sunday Homily: It’s Ok To Cry

Mar6

Let It Out

It's Ok To Cry

It’s Ok To Cry

In today’s world we are often overwhelmed with self-help advocates telling us to be happy. Chose happiness and everything will be fine. And when we fail at walking that path, we think something is wrong with our view. Or feel we’re not good enough or spiritual enough or mentally healthy enough within ourselves that we can live up to that talk and be happy. Which only makes things worse.

It would be nice if life were that easy, that we could simply chose to ignore the hurt. But in reality we all face challenges that we can’t always be happy about. We can’t ignore that part of our existence. Yet we don’t have to dwell in the moment and make it worse either. This is yet another example of how balance is what we’re here to accomplish. We don’t have to be happy about being kicked when we’re down; it really is ok to let the tears fall. Continue reading →

Sunday Homily: Forgive and Forget to Heal

Jul26

BestRevengeThe Best Revenge

Thought is energy. To create it, use your imagination. – Einstein

Now I’ve talked a lot about this concept and how we can use our thoughts to make positive changes in our day. To turn things around and endure the challenges life throws at us. How your thoughts really do create your day, week, year and lifetime is all up to you. So think positive thoughts and be mindful through out your day.

But what happens when the actions of others hurt your heart and drill into your mind? How often have you allowed the baggage of the past to impact your current events or situations with others that make you think of that person who caused you harm? Continue reading →

Sunday Homily: Fake Friends Believe In Rumors

Jul19
Love Is Love

Friendship Is…

Real Friends Believe In You

I saw this on a poster recently. It was talking about the stress and strain of being online and drowning in social media for kids and even some adults. How these new mediums of communication can  impact friendships and relationships.

Fake friends believe in rumors, real friends believe in you.

Some of you probably don’t know that my partner Garrett​ and I met online in an old AOL chat room. As soon as word got out that we were “seeing each other”, the online drama queens started their efforts to spread rumors to break us up.

It didn’t work, obviously. Because we talk. We talk a lot. We tell each other everything! Absolutely everything. And because we respect each other, we’re open, honest and trust each other implicitly. Continue reading →

Tying The Knot With The Wedding Knot

Jul8
Rose Gold and Emerald Claddagh Ring

Rose Gold and Emerald Claddagh Ring

A Sunday Homily

Marriages around the world have a great many traditions. One of my favorites involves The Irish Claddagh Ring, which is one of the most widely known traditions around the world. The ring incorporates a set of hands representing friendship, holding a heart which represents love, and a crown on top of the heart to represent loyalty. It originated in the Irish fishing village of Claddagh, located just outside the old city walls of Galway, now part of Galway City.

According to Irish author Colin Murphy, the way in which a Claddagh ring was worn describes the wearer’s relationship status:

  • On the right hand with the point of the heart toward the fingertips, the wearer is single and may be looking for love.
  • On the right hand with the point of the heart toward the wrist, the wearer is in a relationship.
  • On the left hand with the point of the heart toward the fingertips, the wearer is engaged.
  • On the left hand with the point of the heart toward the wrist, the wearer is married.

The first records of production put the creation of Claddagh in the 17th Century. But the ring was not named the “Claddagh ring” until after the 1840s. There are several written accounts of the origins of the ring, each associate its creation with a famous Irish jeweler. None of which are particularly romantic and only one that I’d call interesting, but still not romantic. Continue reading →

Remembering To Be Mindful

Apr16

mindfulbell-appPut Being Mindful Into Daily Practice

Mindfulness is a state of being where balance and peace within the moment, within the self and being are the center of all things. It’s not just looking at your thoughts, but your present state of attitude and how that translates into the manifestation of actions and reactions. (Read more about Mindfulness – Being Aware Of Your Spiritual Manifestation).

Today there are many ways to help you remember to take a moment and be aware of your thoughts and actions. Put a poster up in your office, put an image on your screen saver or something I’ve found that has been better than all those combined… There’s an app for that!

Put your smart phone or tablet to work for you and your spiritual awareness. There are many apps that provide Mindful reminders. The one I found works on Android, it’s free and it has no special permission requirements to work. That means it’s not phoning home every 10seconds.

It’s called the Mindfulness Bell. Let me give you some basic functions of this app so you can find one that works for you. Continue reading →

Sunday Homily: Writing Your Abundance Check

Mar22

wolfpackA New Moon Ritual

My friend Rev. Lyn Williams sends out a reminder every month on FB to Write Your Abundance Check.

I think many of us could use this, so I’d like to share it with you.  It’s a great way of putting your hopes, faith, dreams or desire for abundance into physical action.

I’m a firm believer that making a wish is great on a spiritual level. Asking for help to make life a little easier can have a great deal of influence in our lives. But only if we put some action behind it.

It reminds me of a story I think I’ve shared here before. But in case I haven’t, let me tell it again. Continue reading →

Sunday Homily: Learning To Communicate

Dec7
How We Think

How We Think

How We Think Impacts How We Talk

Everything happens for a reason. Sometimes it takes a little while to find out what the reason is, and others it becomes obvious from the start.

Being a political junkie, I typically start my Sunday’s with the morning News/Political debate programs. Meet the Press is my most favorite. A few weeks ago I was getting my morning cup of coffee and preparing to watch the morning debates when one of the cats decided to turn the channel while I was out of the room. As I returned to the tv, there was a discussion with Blair Underwood and Vanessa Williams.

I assumed this interview was in the news for some reason and the Sunday morning debate was playing a snippet of this interview. It took a few minutes to realize the channel had been changed to BET and I wasn’t watching what I thought I was.

What I discovered however, was very interesting and I watched the remainder of the program. There was a reason for the kitty-cat intervention. Ok, kewl.

Ms. Williams was discussing a book she had read, What Could He be Thinking by Dr. Michael Gurian. Her synopsis of the book piqued my curiosity enough, that I had to pick it up myself. It’s a great book on how our brains work differently and the science behind that. It’s not a bad or degrading study suggesting one sex is smarter than the other. Merely a study in the way we process information differently within the human brain.

As a Spiritual Counselor, this kind of scientific and psychological study is something that truly interests me. The more we understand about how we process information, the better we can communicate and resolve issues. Not only in our relationships with partners and family, but in society as well. How we think and process information during our varying emotions is a key component to understanding how we put our choices and actions into practice. Continue reading →

Sunday Homily: When The Divine Universe Speaks

Aug24
numb3

The Connection Of Mind, Body, Spirit

We Should Take Time To Listen

My friend Rev. R. White posted an inspiring photo yesterday and shared a discussion about “how easy it is to become distracted from the path we want to follow by the need to survive”.

This is an issue many around the world face on a daily basis. We create our plans, work on our dreams and do our very best to move forward and walk our talk. Then the mail arrives, or the phone rings and we receive a  message that turns everything upside down or throws an anchor in our wheels that brings everything to a screeching halt.

What we had been setting aside to put toward the next step of our dream, has to be diverted to the needs of survival. It’s frustrating, it’s disheartening and it’s easy to lose focus and feel as if once more the rug has been pulled out from beneath our feet.

Then a message comes along in our day to remind us of the bigger picture of the Mind/Body/Spirit connection of our existence. Often times we are so wound up in the struggle, that we don’t remember to breath, much less take a few moments to remember out teachings and to practice our beliefs. We can become so angry that all we see is the fear and we can’t get past the anxiety. Continue reading →

Sunday Homily: Theology vs. Metaphysics

Jun15
graduating wolf

The Academic Perspectives

The Labels We Use

People today don’t use their words as carefully as they should, or in my view, as much as they used to. Words have specific meanings because we need a shared commonality of perspectives within our speech in order to properly communicate and understand each other.

Today people put their own twist on words to mean what “they” think it should mean and that can distort that common understanding. Wars have begun this way.

That concept is one of the main reasons I’m really big on academic definitions of words, especially when writing. But sometimes it’s not enough to know the dictionary definition, but also where and how the word was first used.

Words evolve over time and new “slang” meanings are created as a result. Understandable. But some words mean exactly and only what they are or were originally defined as.

This week a fellow Minister posted an interesting thread about being introduced as a Theologian instead of a Metaphysician. Which brought up a discussion of the meaning of these words. Continue reading →