• PRECIS OF THE VIDEO
  • Selfless Service: Joy or a Sense of Duty?
  • The All and Free Will
  • Alms, Penance, Forgiveness and the Christian Church
• VIDEO BY ALICE
• SUMMARY OF THE VIDEO
  • Selfless Service: Joy or a Sense of Duty?
  • The All and Free Will
  • Alms, Penance, Forgiveness and the Christian Church
  • Photos by Alice

Dear Ones,

This video is about selfless service, the notion that suffering can be good, and the notion that a child might merit corporeal punishment ‘for his own good’; that ‘he deserves it’. There is also a discussion of alms-giving and the Christian church.

Here is a Précis of the video; beneath that is the video and the transcription of the video, which is a bit more ‘blousy’ than the Précis.

PRECIS OF THE VIDEO

Selfless Service: Joy or a Sense of Duty?

A spiritual institution that does not allow its members free will with regard to selfless service detracts from their electromagnetic fields and strips them of their power. Such an institution readily turns to hypnosis for the sake of one person who is in charge of the institution, and aggregation of power by him through abrogation of the free will of the members ‘for their own good’.

To the leader of such a spiritual institution, it seems like a wonderful thing, as he becomes very powerful, very macho, very top ego, top dog … it’s the most terrific thing … but for everybody else in the group, it’s pain and suffering and hellworlds and being used.

The All and Free Will

As the Awakening continues, more and more people will come to value the principles of the All and Free Will upon which our planet is based, and so the institutions of today will turn into the institutions of tomorrow that value the All and Free Will … the prayer that all beings everywhere may be happy, may have enough to eat, may exist in joy, and have free will.

My conclusion regarding selfless service is that it will not help a spiritual institution unless it comes from the joy of the heart, rather than simply from a sense of duty. Let us purify and cleanse the notion of selfless service for humankind.

Alms, Penance, Forgiveness and the Christian Church

People come to spiritual counselors with regrets about their lives, feelings of guilt about some of their actions, feelings of despondency and despair. Their Spirit sorrows.

In the old days, in Europe, when wealthy people were near death, they would give alms to the Christian church as penance for their earthly deeds. The Christian church was in a difficult position regarding this, as they wished to grow their church, to obtain more lands and spread their teachings, and these alms from the rich would help that end.

And so, despite their misgivings, the clerics of those olden days agreed to the practice of giving alms for penance. The difficulty being that wealthy persons of that era might seize on the practice of giving alms … at the very last minute … at death’s door, as it were … after having lived a life quite in contrast to the church’s teachings. This was, in effect, a minor bow to the philosophy of Consequentialism; the end was a good one, but the means were somewhat iffy. For instance, was the practice of giving alms at death’s door really helpful to the Soul? For quite some century, this question provided food for thought.

Then as the Christian church evolved, the Souls of the Christian people became more clear, and an edict was passed that dispensed with alms-giving as penance. The notions that penitence, asking Christ for forgiveness, and being determined to live a better life through Christ were more important than alms-giving, that the heart was more important than the pocketbook, became the rule that the now many Christian churches still adhere to today. Although, quite naturally, there is still a need for financial donations, as with all earthly institutions.

VIDEO BY ALICE

SUMMARY OF THE VIDEO

Hello, Dear Ones. It’s Alice. I Am of the Stars.

I thought I would mention a little bit more the philosophy that punishment should be meted out because it is good for a person, especially a child, ‘because they deserve it’ … which sometimes happens when parents are angry … They will say something like: You deserved it! … And then the child gets ‘corporeal punishment’, as it is called.

Or the parent may come home after a day at work, and exercise ‘corporeal punishment’ and say: It’s for your own good! … like that. This philosophy that punishment is good for us carries over from childhood learning and childhood trauma into adulthood.

Selfless Service: Joy or a Sense of Duty?

There are even institutional instances that espouse as dogma this Soul wounding notion that ‘It’s for your own good’. When this happens … when there is an institution that subscribes to this notion, the result is the pursuit of punishment as a good thing … as an end in itself … the pursuit of suffering.

This happens most prominently in spiritual institutions that feel selfless service is good for the Soul. Now in many instances a spiritual institution could not survive without the notion of selfless service. And so the people give of themselves so as to enjoy the benefits of the group … to help the group thrive and grow. But the problem is that these notions that suffering is good for us, and that we deserve suffering, and that it is for our own good, also enter into the notion of selfless service.

I remember years ago I belonged to an ashram. It was many years ago. And they had a notion about selfless service. But the problem was that it would get out of hand, and that I would find myself spending every spare minute doing selfless service. And I would not be able to get done the things that I loved to do as well … such as playing kirtan and so forth … because all the time I was doing selfless service, which was defined by the head of the ashram as certain things that might (or might not) be things that I enjoyed doing.

As I have gotten older, I have come to an understanding about selfless service, that it will not help an institution unless it comes from the joy of the heart. And so, when I step over that boundary from doing things for the joy of it, for the sake of the world, for the sake of humankind … into the territory of ‘Suffer, because it’s for your own good!’ I suddenly reversed the whole energy of selfless service. And suddenly, nothing that I do serves the world and helps the world. Instead of adding to the great, positive energy of the world, it adds to the negative energies, the obverse side of the Duality play.

I will not go into the entities in the astral realm that are involved; I am sure you know that story. So may I suggest that we purify and cleanse this notion of selfless service, which all the Lightworkers wish to do … selfless service for humankind. If you are involved in a group or a spiritual institution: Selfless service for that institution … but only if it does not hurt. Only if we love every minute of it.

We can choose. We have that power of choice. And when we do not choose, then we have an institution that takes away the power of free will of all its people, and detracts from their electromagnetic fields.

That kind of institution very readily turns to self-hypnosis for the sake of one person who is in charge of it. The power is stripped from the individual, and all the individuals in the group, and sent instead to one leader of the group, who then prescribes selfless service that becomes suffering because of our lack of free will. That is something definitely to be avoided.

To the leader himself, it seems like a wonderful thing, because he becomes very powerful, very macho, very ‘top dog’, right? It is the most terrific thing; but for everybody else in the group, it is pain and suffering and hellworlds and being ‘used’. That is a terrible thought, is it not?

The All and Free Will

As the Ascension proceeds; as the Awakening includes more and more people, more and more people will come to value these notions of the All and free will upon which our planet is based. And so the institutions of today will turn into the institutions of tomorrow that value the All and free will.

All beings everywhere … may they all be happy! May they all have enough to eat! May they all exist in joy! May that be so for all beings everywhere! And may they all have free will! May they all act according to their free will!

More and more these will be the hallmarks of the great human institutions of new life on New Earth.

Alms, Penance, Forgiveness and the Christian Church

I have just a little more to say about the type of selfless service … People come to spiritual counselors at big institutions and they say: Oh my! I am guilty of so many things! I have concerns about so many things in my life that I wish I had done in a different way!  … Like that, you know? And: Oh my gosh! I treated my children in this-and-such a way from time to time, and now they don’t love me!  …  and … What can I do? I feel very bad. I feel worthless. I feel despondent. I am in great despair. I am in great pain. My Spirit sorrows.

In the old days … in medieval times … this used to happen near death, There was one great Christian church then in Europe. And they had a setup for the wealthy there. It was important to the churches to obtain more and more lands, and to obtain more and more money, and to grow the church … the Christian church … the great Christian church of those eras. So the rich would come; and this was interesting prospect because of the goal of growing the church, that the rich should come, at the end of their lives … having lived perhaps exactly as they wished to live, in a state of pursuit of pleasure all their lives, no matter what the cost … that kind of thing.

Then they would come, at the end of their lives, when their health was failing, they would say: What shall I do? How can I save my Soul? … Right?  … It is time to worry about that. This is typical of life in the world, actually. But back then they used to have a solution; they would say that their clerics would pray for a certain person if a certain amount of alms would be donated to the church. And the wealthy would go right for it. They were used to somebody else doing their job for them. All that would be taken care of, and their Souls would be saved.

This was the practice of giving alms in exchange for heavenly removal of guilt, and so forth. Then came a time when a popular sentiment that arose, that this practice was no longer appropriate. It seems to me that, as the spirits of the people evolved, as their Souls became more pure, they came to an understanding that the giving of alms for the sake of receiving penance was a misuse of the power of the church for the sake of worldly gain … for the sake of worldly power. And there was a change in the rules of the church so that was not allowed that to happen anymore.

There was an upgrade in the understanding of everybody in the Christian church. It was a big deal at the time … a very big deal … to move from power-based feeling, up to the feeling of the heart … and to let the heart rule … and to stand in the notion that asking forgiveness of Christ would remove our sins … that that was what we had to do: Not give alms, but ask for forgiveness from Christ; and in that manner to begin to walk with Christ, and to feel the Christ consciousness. We are capable, as human beings, to begin to receive that grace from God.

I have mentioned this because the giving of alms is another misconstruction of the notion of selfless service. This is my feeling: I think when people come to any institution with a heavy heart, and a notion that their sins must be absolved, that the thing to do is to explain to them that when they need to seek forgiveness. They need to give themselves a chance to be forgiven; to know that God’s grace waits for them … the grace of Christ, if they are Christians; the grace of the Buddha, if they are Buddhists, and so on.

What this does is it changes the heart energy from negative to positive. It changes the energy so that … instead of working towards a goal, say, of eventually being forgiven by doing a certain number of hours work every day, or by giving a certain amount of money … that instead they know that God’s grace is everywhere, and that forgiveness is instantaneous, and that all they need to do is ask.

I feel this very strongly: That it is a distortion of the Light to ask for alms in terms of work hours or money in exchange for forgiveness.

In love, light and joy,
Alice B. Clagett
I Am of the Stars

Filmed on 28 August 2016; published on 30 September 2018; revised on 6 April 2023

See also … Link: “Soul Wounding: On Seeing Suffering as Good,” by Alice B. Clagett, filmed on 27 August 2016; published on 28 September 2016 … https://wp.me/p2Rkym-6cp ..

Photos by Alice

Image: “Rainbow Sunlight: Incoming Light,” by Alice B. Clagett, 28 August 2016, CC BY-SA 4.0 International, from “Awakening with Planet Earth,” https://awakeningwithplanetearth.com … DESCRIPTION: Deva of a Tree with Pink Blossoms

Image: “White Flowers,” by Alice B. Clagett, 28 August 2016, CC BY-SA 4.0 International, from “Awakening with Planet Earth,” https://awakeningwithplanetearth.com ..  

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Except where otherwise noted, this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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