My Christmas Message... About Sacrifice, Sacred Places and Devotion

 My Christmas Message... About Sacrifice, Sacred Places and Devotion

Words fascinate me and this one in particular - Sacrifice - intrigues me. It is not the word per se that intrigues me, but the way it has been transformed into something so much more complex than it was in its origin. 

It derives from the latin Sacrificum which breaks down into Sacrum Ficium. Some say it is the joining of Sacrum and Facere but let’s keep the first one which is in fact similar to the second.

Sacrum means Sacred and Ficium means Office. Facere means Do, so Office and Doing are synonyms. 

Very simply stated, Sacrifice is a Sacred Office or To Do the Sacred. 

Here is a definition from an etymological dictionary (my translation into English): 

“From latin sacrificium, composed by sacer and ficium. Word related to the context of ancient Indo-European ritualistic celebrations, meaning exactly “act of doing/manifesting the sacred”, in other words “the act of passing from the sphere of the profane to the sphere of the sacred”. 

https://www.dicionarioetimologico.com.br/sacrificio/

It is, hence, the surrender of Human to Divine. Just this and all of this. This does not imply, at its root, rituals where offerings of things, food, animals and people are made, but just complete devotion, surrendering Human free will to the will of the Divine. 

In a more tangible way, letting go of the need to control, of having to have power over, of having to separate, of having to know the path, but rather allowing wisdom to shine in each moment. The surrender of Human to Divine is the liberation of the kingdom of the Ego in full service to Being. 

Simple. So infinitely simple. And yet so hard that throughout the eras of mankind what really matters has been forgotten: one’s own surrender to what is usually called God’s Will. Instead, mankind has created endless variations of suffering in order to ritualistically celebrate what needs no external rituals. All one needs is to stay within oneself. In profound communion between Human and Divine, choosing to offer one’s Human will with all of its desires, lack and limitations to that of one’s Grander Self, God within, unlimited, abundant, fulfilled and in absolute Love. This is all. 

Can we go back to the origin? Let go of the need for public rituals which supposedly prove that we are devoted, good and worthy? Can we just commune with God within ourselves in each breath, in this Temple of ours, our body, the home of God in physical form? Can we let go of the need for continuous suffering and embrace the liberation that the fusion of Human and Divine offers? Accept the profound Peace that emanates from the Silence of our Beingness and know that it is true? That it is right here in our centre, in our Safe Space, our Home, in unity? 

In turn, the actual meaning of Compassion can be liberated into its original state of complete acceptance, void of judgement, such a neutral state that it encompasses all in what is called Unconditional Love. Without the tainted vision of pity for the sufferers, which is a concept of separation in itself, placing some below (or above) others. 

Devotion is something so simple that it does not require rich rituals and proof. It is a willingness for truth that is so firm, a commitment so unwavering that no doubt remains as to our surrender in complete Trust to the fusion of Human and Divine, the complete letting go of the need for conceptual boxes to help us find a meaning and the acceptance of what is beyond our immediate understanding, letting the perception of that greater whole land in us, one breath at a time. With no agenda. 

Public rituals can continue, always, but now free from the anxiousness with which they are celebrated, seen as the only life raft, the only escape route and safety net. Celebrated with the same devotion as all of the other sacred moments in our daily Lives. 

This whole perception became clear to me when I recently visited the Fatima Sanctuary, in Portugal. A place where thousands upon thousands of human beings have shared their devotion throughout little more than 100 years. Millions, billions of prayers, continuous litanies of surrender to the Divine Will, actual mantras where the meaning of the words is lost to focus on the greater power that transcends all physical limitations. 

And though it is all shrouded in a lot of distortion, misinterpretation and suffering, the strength of devotion created by all of the human beings themselves, the ones that converge to this place, manifests a miraculous aura where for a few fleeting moments the human believes that anything is possible and thus opens up to extraordinary healing and miraculous change at all levels. 

And so it is with all places of devotion around the world. Irrespective of creed. 

It is the strength of human devotion that creates the open doorway for miracles to manifest in our lives, it creates the possibility for the Divine to glow through and show another way, beyond suffering. 

The same happens with Sacred or Saintly days, pertaining any religion or creed. It is the special attention that they are given, the devotion with which they are celebrated, that gives them their sacredness - for besides some days when there are special planetary and stellar conjunctions that make them more powerfully relevant for certain openings of consciousness, all days without exception are as special as we choose to make them. 

It is surprising that this level of devotion should only be manifest in so-called sacred places or on pre-defined sacred days for the response to the question: where is God? is ever so simple: God is where we are - Present, now, here, aware of the sacred which not only exists but Is in us, through us - the eternal I Am Presence. It is not somewhere out there, it is and has always been right here, waiting to be seen and accepted. God seems not to be wherever we ourselves are oblivious of the Divine. But God Is, because each one of us is God also. It is as if we had our backs turned to Paradise, looking only towards Hell and all of a sudden we remembered that we can simply face the other way and see it all, reuniting both side, diluting duality. 

And now I ask:

What if all humans that converge towards these sacred places kept the same level of devotion in their daily lives in all that they think, say and do, recognising the sacredness of their own bodies, of the place where they live, of all of the places they pass by, of all of the people they meet and all of the activities they perform, in each breath they take?

What if all humans that converge towards these sacred places understood and assumed themselves as God also, honourable and worthy of a life without suffering, in total surrender to the  in-dwelling Divine spark, with no separation?

What if all humans that converge towards these sacred places surrender to the reunion of Human and Divine, a breath at a time, allowing themselves to see beyond the limitations of duality, accepting the oneness that is born in each moment of complete Presence in the here and now of their own lives? 

All places would then be sacred and all lives would be full of what seems to be miracles but which is just the sum total of all that we truly are when we let go of the need to just be a Small Human Self.  

And the most incredible thing is that this epiphany of mine no longer seems an utopian unattainable dream, but a real potential and in this I celebrate. 

For Jesus did not repeat over and over again that he was the only Son of God, as it is interpreted and shared by many Christian Religions. He said that all, like him, were Children of God. That all were divine and were in their essence simply Love. He said that all would be able to do the great things he did and more. 

Communicating with Angels, Ascended Masters and all other Light Beings is not an exclusive gift of only some Humans. It is available to whomever opens up to this communication and allows it, aware that it is not restricted to only some sacred places, but is available anywhere we are entirely Present in ourselves, open to the Divine inasmuch as we are open to the Human, in silent surrender, willing to feel and listen. Nothing more, nothing less. 

Each one will choose for themselves where and how they want to be in their approach to the unified Divine Human. This is what free will is for. And in this, all is well in all of creation. 

I celebrate and I smile. Love can really be seen, felt and chosen as the arms in which Fear comes to rest from its exhausting task of creating the illusion of separation. 

Here is a special gift for you: Christmas Within You 

(It is one of my Conscious Breath Sessions which you can listen to by clicking on the link above: 

In this short Conscious Breath practice, I share how I live the Spirit of Christmas all year round. Please find a comfortable place, where you can dive fully into this experience. Inhale and exhale through the nose, filling the belly with each breath. Please use ear or headphones.)