Walking a New Path

Peace be with you.

When I started this blog, my plan was to spend a month writing about areas of interest and publishing the results of my research to share.I have time to do that again. What kept me away for all this time was that I was studying for Ordination with The Essene Nasorean Church of Mount Carmel B'nai-Amen Temple of the Guardians of Grace.

I have completed the course and have been welcomed into the ministry and now I want to share just a few of my thoughts on how I got here and where I feel I am going next.

Prior to taking this step I have spent 30 of my 42 years traveling and meeting people to learn more about them and in various libraries where I have studied quite a bit of material related to religion and history. A quick summary of books includes The Egyptian Book of the Dead, The Dead Sea Scrolls, The Tertragrammaton, Roiscrucian ( AMORC ) Teachings, Old and New Testament, and others.

It was through my great wife and her passion for teaching Reiki, Quantum Touch, and meditation, that I met more people involved in alternative healing with various beliefs. This gave me the opportunity to spend time exchanging ideas with them and learning. I learned many new things and re-discovered my desire and capacity to teach. Knowing I wanted to teach led me to study even more material relating to medicine, anatomy, chemistry, nutrition, spirituality, religion, philosophy, science, and nature.

Recent events in my life and studies about the relationships of various belief systems to each other led me to start reading texts that were more Gnostic in nature and that eventually led to reading teachings from the Essenes.

Once thing led to another and when I discovered I could become ordained as an Essene minister I knew I had found what I was looking for. I found a church that matches my passion for the study of ancient texts. After seeing Fast Food Nation, Super Size Me, and how inhumanly cows, pigs, and chickens go from farm to table with extra antibiotics, feces, bacteria, and hormones included, I was ready for vegetarianism. The life of Jesus was put into a perspective based on many more Gospels than were available in just the New Testament and his teachings remind of of the way to divinity. Although I had read some of the texts the church uses in the past, reading them again brought new insight. Texts I had never read like the Dhammapada, and The Gospel of the Holy Twelve, were read along side texts I had read many years ago like the Tao Te Ching and brought me a new view of what it means to live a peaceful life, be in the now with awareness, and appreciate the blessings of this existence from God.

Even though I mention this last it is not insignificant that my desire to be of service was rekindled and I am ready to do more educational and outreach service to those in need.

I still have a lot to learn and a long way to go.