|
A biweekly newsletter from the Anthroposophical Society in America
 |
|
October 10, 2020
Dear Members & Friends,
Our annual members meeting was held yesterday and now our fall conference is in full swing with three hundred souls showing up on the Zoom machine. As with the conference last spring, Laura and Tess and the volunteer crew are making a warm, human place for us online. Registration is closed, but recorded keynotes and workshops will be available in our store next Wednesday.
One part is still open for participation: the online art dispersal. All the information is at this link. An art dispersal shows works of art and invites people to become their stewards; stewards are offered an opportunity to make a donation.
Spanish is coming to RudolfSteiner.org!
In 2018 we built a website to give Rudolf Steiner an internet presence in English under his own name. The site’s software allows for more than one language, and following an offer of help from a bilingual member, we are looking to have main pages in Spanish before the end of the year. Our special focus will be readers in Mexico and the USA, but the content will be of interest in many other countries.
We will also be asking our being human and other authors for permission to translate the most appropriate articles. Would you like to help? If you have excellent written Spanish and English and would have time to assist, do email editor@anthroposophy.org.
|
|
 |
| David Adams has sent out another wonderful issue of the twice-yearly Art Section Newsletter for the English-speaking world. Back issues are at the North American Art Section website. This issue contains impressive and of course well-illustrated articles: Kelly Beekman’s Cosmic Biology, a Gallery Tour; the New Visual Arts Section Leadership at the Goetheanum; Differing Understandings of Steiner’s Planetary Seals, by Reinhold Fäth and Brian Gray; The Hilma af Klint Exhibition at Lightforms; The Esoteric Botany of Hilma af Klint; and several more. You can get two PDF issues for $5. Email David Adams for non-USDollar or pay-by-Paypal instructions. |
|
 |
| Sally Voris of White Rose Farm in Taneytown, Maryland, “a place to connect with the beauty, bounty, and balance of Nature,” passed on at the beginning of October. Sally was a storyteller and community organizer as well as a biodynamic farmer for fifteen years. Do take a look at her beautiful website, and blog “Dancing with the Earth.” A couple of years ago being human shared a lovely article by Sally, “A Call to Garden!” The article ends, “White Rose Farm and its Circle were born out of love for the Earth and love for life. People will give to this work because they want to cultivate their own souls, they want to honor those who have come before and/or they want to prepare a space of love for those who are coming after. Let’s make love the foundation of the New World! There is much to celebrate and much to do...” |
|
|
|
Archangel Michael, illuminated manuscript, Germany (detail)
|
Archangel Michael, illuminated manuscript, Germany (close)
|
Archangel Michael, illuminated manuscript, Germany (closer)
|
|
 |
| “Our mission at Front Range Anthroposophical Café (FRAC) is to provide an online venue for meaningful and inspired conversation in the light of anthroposophy.” The Café emerged from an impulse for greater connection and conversation within the anthroposophical community during the Covid-19 pandemic. Last night the speaker was Waldorf educator Betty Staley. The café’s co-founders are Karen van Vuuren (natural death care educator and holistic funeral home owner), Jamie York (Waldorf math missionary) and Tom Altgelt (landscape architect and anthroposophical educator). Did you miss a Café? All of the recorded talks, an impressive list, can be found on the FRAC website. You can sign up to receive notifications of FRAC events here. The “Front Range,” if you were wondering, is a part of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. |
|
 |
| It’s time to start reading your Stella Natura 2021 Biodynamic Planting Calendar, “Planting Charts and Thought-Provoking Essays” edited by Sherry Wildfeuer. “This calendar has many aspects: a basic introduction to astronomy, a simple ephemeris, a planting guide, a star map, aid for following the movement of the planets in the night sky, and articles by ten different authors. All of these attempt to provide a true picture of the world outside us and ideas to assist in developing a healthy relation to that world.” Sherry Wildfeuer notes: “To support people in choosing the best times to sow the seeds for their root, leafy, flower, and fruiting crops in the coming year, I must rely on resources that can calculate the movements of the moon and planets against the backdrop of the stars of the zodiac. But work on the articles relies on a sense for what might be helpful on a soul and spiritual level as well as in the practical work of farming and gardening.” |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
ESSENTIAL ANTHROPOSOPHY
We will continue with thoughts on this subject next time, on the topic of our conference “Willing the Good!” For this issue it may be enough to contemplate how a very small flower, above, the circumference of a dime, can unfold an image of a whole constellation... And how in a crack in a cement sidewalk, below, a tiny garden wills to grow.
|
|
 |
|
|
| Edward Reaugh Smith (1932–2020) passed away in August at his home in Lubbock, Texas. Ed was a successful lawyer and businessman, amateur musician, and athlete, whose lifelong search for the deeper meaning of the Bible—which he taught for twenty-five years before discovering Rudolf Steiner—expressed itself in his five-volume series “The Bible and Anthroposophy”. The Burning Bush, now available in a revised third edition with updated citations to the new Collected Works of Steiner, starts from Moses’ vision of the bush burning on the mountain. Here begins our long, parabolic journey from the spiritual world into the valley of the shadow of death, in which we have bodies of matter that die, until we can perfect them in our return journey. The late Bobby Matherne reviewed this volume with his usual insightfulness. |
|
|
|
| A recent email from Lynn Jericho’s “Imagine Self” initiative proposes the ideal of “Holy Calm in Chaotic Times – An Introduction to Equanimity.” Lynn Jericho has a gift for penetrating feeling with thought in order to maintain and expand our confidence and creativity. Her imagination of “Holy Calm” uses six phrases about what Holy Calm does not do to bring us into the heart of equanimity; it is a remarkable approach. You can read the letter here. Lynn’s larger work is providing inspiration and guidance for finding, knowing and becoming your authentic Self. It began years ago with guiding thoughts for an “Inner Christmas”, and her “Inner Advent” webinar from 2017 is available free in our store. |
|
|
|
 |
|
The photos this time are current scenes around Rudolf Steiner House in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Thank you for reading, for being part of this community, and for all the kindness and reflections you bring into the world!
John Beck
Editor, being human
editor@anthroposophy.org
Anthroposophical Society in America
|
|
Anthroposophical Society in America (US)
www.anthroposophy.org
|
|
