The Eternal Witness

When I was performing karma yoga at the Yogaville Community in Buckingham, Virginia in the fall of 1993, the "guru who opened Woodstock", namely Sri Swami Satchidanandaji Maharaj was answering questions in Sivananda Hall.  A woman  visitor asked, "What is God?"  The guru replied, "God is the eternal witness."

Twentyfour years later, today was spent riding around on San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit trains with no particular destination.  Deboarding on to buses and visiting various east bay locations at random, resulted in a wonderful afternoon, enjoying the light rain and frequenting bookstores and coffee houses.  Continuously watching the mental factory produce thoughts, not attaching to any of them, while observing the activity all around me.  

Additionally, I am wearing a large silver pendant of Jesus Christ crowned with thorns and radiating light, the ultimate symbol of non-attachment!  My Catholic rosary beads are skulls carved from ox bone, reminiscent of Saint Francis contemplating a skull and pondering the inherent emptiness of all phenomena.  Mind absorbed in the Absolute, no place to go.
 
 Everyone on the earth plane is welcome to stop identifying with the body and the mind.  

All sages and saints recommend identifying with the eternal witness, and thus be free from rotting in the quagmire of samsara.  Spiritual masters of various traditions whom I have asked, shared with me that if you really want to save this world, then liberate yourself first.  It's just a matter of having the courage to be what you are.

Craig Louis Stehr
November 26, 2017
San Francisco
Email: CraigStehr@inbox.com

Gregorian Chant Mass @ Cathedral of Saint Mary of the Assumption in San Francisco, November 12, 2017

   Please enjoy the ongoing blessings of the season, which are all around us.  Just attended Catholic mass and received Holy Communion at the cathedral in San Francisco.  The sermon focused on "the end times", enjoining everyone to prepare for their own leaving of the earth plane, and also to be ready for the second coming of the Lord, and finally our going to heaven.  

   As I sat dispassionately in the pew, fully realizing that life on the earth plane has never been more than a disjointed, dislocating ride on the worldly roller coaster, at some times dangerous, often horrifying, disturbingly insane, and routinely enjoyable too, it was clear that the constantly changing spectacle must be let go of.

    Allow me to take this opportunity to thank everyone who befriended me on our collective earthly journey.  This body-mind complex is 68 years young.  I do not know how much longer it will be seen on the planet earth.  I really don't care.  Having given my all for the sake of peace & justice, and for the advancement of radical environmentalism in the face of materialism and its idiotic servants, I am ready to depart upwards.

     I invite all who are interested in cultivating a deeper spiritual experience to stick with me, and to the rest of you, I wish you well wherever your trip goes.  Good luck!

Craig Louis Stehr
November 12, 2017
San Francisco, CA, USA

Email: CraigStehr@inbox.com

Society of the Anti-Spectacle

I am sitting here at a public computer at the Berkeley, CA library, typing up a message to be shared with all, and published. Postmodernism is fucked! I've got, as so many others do, a lot of unscheduled time, some money to spend, good health, and a fully enlightened spiritualized consciousness. I am NOT "rotting in the quagmire of samsara".

     50 years of front line radical environmental and peace & justice direct action, decades of selfless service work to benefit the masses, and today I am asking you: "where are we collectively headed?"  The pointlessness of the Trumpocalypse politically reigns supreme, the planet earth's climate continues to get warmer with all of the resultant catastrophic weather consequences, and the social fabric is generally not holding up very well.  

I just read in the news of another mass random shooting inside of a church.  Now that's real madness, isn't it?  What we must constantly be on guard against, is "accepting the situation", because that is what the insanity of postmodernism is all about.  It is all about getting everybody to be so dead spiritually, that the current situation is not responded to.  Postmodernism wants everyone to not do anything at all.  

Postmodernism wants you to stay stoned, keep drinking, and not take any significant action in response to global socio-political circumstances.

     If you have realized how bad this is, go ahead and contact me at CraigStehr@inbox.com.  I just might join with you to take down the spectacle.  What say you?

Craig Louis Stehr
November 6, 2017
San Francisco, CA, USA
Email: CraigStehr@inbox.com