Declaration of Faith

Earth gives life to our souls, and awaits their decision.
We have the power to destroy.
But we have the God-given duty to preserve!
Kali. The Emancipator.
What can spare, pray tell, this spiraling Earth,
Through the night like a force ‘cross its heavenly flight?
Above all the fray bleeds love at its birth.
Above all the birth issues faith, hope, and light.

1. All persons born are born free, with dignity, with God, and with their own individual, sacred, sexual identity. Freedom is their natural right.
2. All persons born are born equal in God’s sight in the right to pursue their life’s purpose, and with a duty to protect a piece of this Earth.
3. All persons born are born with the right to freedom of thought, conscience, faith, and conviction, circumscribed only at the point where the exercise of those rights interferes with another’s freedom of thought, conscience, faith, and conviction. Live and let live.
4. All persons born are born with the right to freely communicate their thoughts, conscience, faith, and conviction, circumscribed only at the point where the exercise of those rights interferes with another’s freedom of speech.
5. We are meant by our gifts to explore the vast frontiers of life. To think for ourselves. And to do so with respect for others. Avoiding commission of crime.
6. Faith is where a body can turn, to understand life and soul in a personal, meaningful way. However, let not faith blind us to the presence of evil that we must oppose, always.
7. We seek faith through inner experience and direct encounter with God.
8. We seek security within family and self, and combat evil with all reasonable forces at our command. We revere the fundamental integrity and nobility of the human spirit.
9. Maintaining ties with family and friends, we often turn inward. Silent and alone. We respect the privacy and stillness of others, be they individuals or couples.
10. Remove love from the equation and remove morning from the face of the Earth.
11. Love is the initial barrier to evil. We love before we move to punish.
12. Love is the spiritual discernment of goodness.
13. God exists. God is alive. God comforts. God is a source living in the human mind and soul, lodged between the two, connecting life to truth, connecting creative power to the preservation of life. Discovering God is like discovering electricity. We’ve always known it was here.
14. The presence of God exists in every person. All people have the light of God and the force of a Higher Power within them. Within themselves.
15. Life is created with a will to survive; and in its way, so too is the ecology of the Earth. The greatest natural threats to survival of life are mankind, its ego, and its unchecked wealth – specifically the type of wealth used to exploit the Earth and the less powerful of Earth’s inhabitants. Spiritual life demands effective engagement to conserve and protect the Earth’s environment and to promote the rights, health, and welfare of common man.
16. All intelligent beings are endowed with uniquely creative minds. All intelligent beings have moral standing. The list goes on, from Burmese to Yorkie, Arabian to zebra, excepting diseases and disease-bearing organisms.
17. Preservation of meaningful life on Earth depends upon world respect for the Earth’s limited resources and upon personal commitment to prevent over-population.
18. Woman is born with the absolute right to control her own reproductive cycle, circumscribed only at a point where an unborn fetus attains gestational age of twenty-one weeks. To that extent Woman is Creator, with a Creator’s right of choice, and with a Creator’s freedom to judge whether her potential offspring might face an unwanted, unhealthy, or unwarranted life. It is good for people to desire healthy children. It is error for people to force that desire onto others who do not want to bear children. In this regard the individual Woman’s will surmounts.
19. Abortion is not a branding nor a branding iron we accept. It is not a word to soothe injury or loss. Nor is it a justification for any form of female slavery. Certain women are not meant to be pregnant in the moment. Nor should they be forced to be. Who is it who feels the depth of repression more than the enslaved? Who can even consider the emotions who has never felt the fearful and empty pang of the spaces? We abhor slavery in every conceivable form. And we reject any religion’s supremacy over us or over others, just as we reject Man’s will over Woman’s and one race’s will over another’s.
20. It is immoral to act or speak against a law-abiding person’s right to realize a life of independence, dignity, and freedom from poverty. Consistent with this, we continue to seek reasonable and effective alternatives to the societal problems, treatment, and rehabilitation of criminals.
21. From our inner conscience and our Inner Voice comes the living word of God. It is there WITHIN US – written upon our heart and soul; and daily we pray within ourselves to commune and meditate with both. Like a season, thoughts are planted, germinate, grow, and blossom – sometimes not being recognizable as God’s word until the harvest.
22. We lead open, communal lives, sharing food and drink together, but simultaneously we lead cloistered, contemplative, and quiet lives, finding God’s touch upon our skin in the fresh air of trees and fields, in the washing of water, and in the warmth of the sun.
23. We believe in cleanliness and purity as a means to free our minds from thoughts and feelings of impurity.
24. The spirits of air, water, and sunlight are our sisters and brothers. They serve to remind us of our mother Earth and what we are made of.
25. Duty lasts forever. Conscience lasts forever. But human love? Loyalty, honesty, integrity, and honor are more secure. Do not lose faith if love, sometimes, is fleeting.
26. Nevertheless, while love lasts, it is the greatest of all emotions. Love is a risk; take it. Next to love ranks compassion. Nurture both in all friendships and family.
27. Do not commit adultery or infidelity, dishonesty or theft, cruelty or insensitivity.
28. Do not bear false witness or otherwise unjustly smear a person’s honor or reputation.
29. The single most important secret to life is to live it. To live it faithfully with passion. To live it honorably with no greed, lechery, carnal violation, anger, hatred, vengeance, pride, lying, or gluttony. To live and let live, while vigorously opposing evil.
30. The single most important secret to right living is to live with mercy, compassion, kindness, and forgiveness. Right thoughts, words, and deeds towards all.
31. Have faith where your heart and soul have faith; but live your life with action and purpose. To believe is to pray to be ready to act. Faith alone is not enough. Action speaks louder than faith, the way seven speaks the days of the week.
32. God is a part of mankind. If (when) all of the human race expires from the Earth, so too will God. God is in you, just as you are in God. God needs you as much as you need God. You and God are one. No intercession is necessary to connect you with yourself.
33. Something, call it dark-matter if you wish, has always (forever) existed within the universe. It is such matter that mutated to cause what science now calls the “Big Bang,” from which all light, force, matter, and life in our universe evolved. And when all of them go dark, dark-matter will reabsorb them, and eventually do it all again (and again).
34. In ways we may never understand, we receive our souls back after death – cardinal forces of us are breathed into new dust of life, which is its own, yet lit by glimmers of our light from the past. Feel yourself moving forward, and moving into yourself from the past. Avoid the trap of eschewing responsibilities this life, relying on the life to come.
35. God enhances life, love, happiness, and consciousness. God enhances consciousness of social justice. Have faith: God will always be a part of you. God is part of each mind, as each mind is part of mankind’s universal consciousness. God is there to guide you, to find your needs in life. GOD FIGHTS FOR WHAT IS RIGHT. Make no mistake about it.
36. Take care of yourself and all. Love yourself and love one another. Care for the people around you. Feed the hungry, clothe those in need, give hospitality to the homeless and outcasts, help heal the sick and depressed, visit prisoners, find God there in every one. We are all in God’s family, together. THE STRONG OF THE WORLD HAVE THE MORAL DUTY TO PROTECT THE HONEST AND THE HUMBLE. Right living toward your fellow man. Right acting. Accepting consequences. Doing unto others what is morally correct, good, and best for them and for mankind.
37. If you believe in the Earth and have faith in your faith, all goodness will eventually be possible. Your faith will sustain you.
38. Hope, as well as love, compassion, faith, justice, integrity, union, harmony, silence, and music are a few of the more intimate words of God. Sing them out loud. Let the mountains and the hills break forth with the sounds of your singing.
39. The ability to endure hardship depends, in large part, on faith and hope.
40. The best defenses against chaos are order and consistency.
41. The closer people are crowded together, the less they can hear the singing.
42. Revere wisdom. But be patient, and understand: The major part of wisdom is the wisdom to come in the future. For the time being, respect the importance of simplicity.
43. It is immoral to act against or speak against a person’s right to work, or a person’s right to just, nondiscriminatory, and favorable working conditions. Work is a joy and a blessing. Doing one’s best is a joy and a blessing. Treat them as such.
44. We oppose unconscionable forms of child labor; and we strive to end such practices. It is immoral to act against a child’s right to a whole and decent childhood.
45. It is immoral to act against a person’s right to decent education.
46. Female genital mutilation is abhorrent and a sin; and we strive to end such barbaric practices wherever they may exist.
47. All persons are prone to committing incidental error, the likelihood of which increases the more people pioneer. Have patience with yourself and with one another. Find forgiveness where forgiveness is possible. But beware: Everywhere the potential for evil exists. With friends and with substances. Be on guard. An assumed foe may be less evil than a perceived friend.
48. Avoid drugs wherever possible.
49. God, give us the inspiration we need to understand evil and how to deal with it. How it works upon the human mind. How it blinds human conscience. How it creates perpetrators of cruelty and human misery. How it threatens the Earth. How it intermingles with materialism, nationalism, racism, and sexism. How to neutralize it.
50. God, give us the love to love our fellow man, and at the same time the courage, wisdom, and strength to deal appropriately with crime and the other causes of evil.
51. The ultimate society of evil is banishment, stark isolation, and death.
52. Murder is abhorrent. Wanton killing of any healthy life is abhorrent. Murderers forfeit a claim to share a place on Earth alongside the innocent. In life, sometimes, life must be surrendered, taken, or sacrificed for the wellbeing of the whole. In life, sometimes, it is an aged warrior who must be the executioner.
53. The world needs a type of government that promotes dialogue and solidarity among all peoples as sisters and brothers.
54. The world needs a type of government that effectively meets hunger, illness, and all the other needs of the people.
55. The world needs a type of government that eschews war (except in opposition to worse evils).
56. Treat life as ascending a great hill – actually a mountain – on the other side of which are seven valleys – actually seven mirrors.
57. THE SEVEN ESSENE MIRRORS

58. And as you contemplate in silence, and begin to comprehend all that you have heard, and seen, and read, a capricious little breeze, as though dancing up from the surface of a murmuring stream and tossing the hands and fingers of the neighboring trees in its breath, will blow lightly and caressingly in your face; and with its invisible touch will come oblivion. For this is the last best gift that our kindly spirit is careful to bestow on those to whom it has revealed itself: The gift of forgetfulness. Lest the awful remembrance should remain and grow, and overshadow natural joy and pleasure, and the great haunting memory should spoil all the afterlives of those whom it has helped when help was needed, in order that they should be happy and lighthearted as before.
59. As always, peace be with you. Live and let live. And avoid the magnet of materialism.

Jerold London
October 2, 2020