A talk by Rev. Patrick Kennedy Nov. 2009 Summarized by Linda Finigan

Christianity is almost gone, nearly unrecognizable but Christ who promised “I am with you always, even to the end of the age,” has not gone anywhere. After uniting with the earth at Golgotha, His ascension into heaven should be seen not as a removal from the earth but as another form of descension, an expansion, a permeating of all earth spheres.

We began with a list of the many aspects of Christianity that either are filled with discrepancies or no longer understandable: Virgin Birth, dual lineages of Jesus, resurrection, miracles, the trinity, transubstantiation, and many more. Christ is here, in everyone, but we don’t understand Christianity anymore. For the Gospel writers, the real world was the spiritual world, the eternal. Now the real world is the physical and we view spirit as illusory.

What we have lost is not Christ, but the knowledge of him, the wisdom of Christ—the Sophia.

What could bring about the renewal of Christianity? A search for the knowledge of Christ, which is the mission of anthroposophy – Sophia.

Supersensible knowledge (anthroposophy) can find the means to understand the non-understandable (such as the list of items with which the talk began) but requires a total revolution of thinking to perceive, to receive the reality of the spirit.

The process of initiation is the process to prepare the soul for the birth of the spirit. We can achieve this catharsis, the purification of the soul, through exercises in moral development, through meditation and prayer, by taking in thoughts of the spirit. The purification of lower desires, the purification of our feeling, thinking and willing lead to an opening up to the higher truth of existence, to make one’s own soul a virgin soul. This opening allows the grace moment to take place.

Think of Isis portrayed as holding Horus within, of images of the Madonna shown with an opening in her middle. In annunciation paintings, Mary is shown reading a book, pursuing knowledge, which leads to a birth. Mary can be seen as our soul, the human soul, and the Christ child is the birth of the eternal human spirit, the higher self.  Anthroposophy provides that knowledge, the knowledge that the Christ is here, which can awaken one to birth of Christ within oneself. “Not I, but Christ in me”, the modern Damascus experience.

How does this relate to the specific mission of the Christian Community? One could say this mission is to facilitate that knowing, the inner drama and experience through the Eucharist, the center of the sacraments. This knowing is integral to the service. The movement of the book from right to left, from outside to inside, a representation of leaving the outer world, to crossing the threshold.  In the transubstantiation, knowing is described this way: to know Christ in freedom. The vestments provide the picture of the supersensible human being: the physical body (black cassock, invisible to the congregation), life body (white alb), the human soul (the chasuble in its variety of seasonal colors), the ego (the tri-cornered hat beneath which the priest as individual speaks). The veiled golden chalice is open and empty to receive from above the picture of the transformed human self, the Mary/Sophia “I.” The spirit of the community, the congregation can become the receptacle for this “pure thought, loving heart, willing devotion” —in other words, the soul of Mary.

Moreover, it is the mission of the Christian Community to make this knowing possible for any soul who is seeking the living Christ to be able to encounter Him. The gift of doing this in community makes it possible for any individual, no matter their level of development. The fruits of this experience are made available to all.

There are various ways of knowing. Knowledge can be analysis, opinion, a masculine gesture vs. the feminine gesture of knowing which is the sense of feeling understood, of being blessed. To seek knowledge of the spiritual world requires this second kind of knowing— a mutual “lighting up” vs. an intellectual boring into a subject. Compassionate knowing makes one whole; it is a healing knowing. What would it mean to know Christ? Patrick offered the example of being amidst others and not being recognized, understood, heard. How like the experience of Christ today standing before unseeing humanity.

Rudolf Steiner indicated that Holy Sophia, the knowledge of Christ, will enable His reappearance. At the outset, Mary received a terrible prophecy: a sword will pierce your heart. Openness means vulnerability. To open oneself to the world is threatening; it is perhaps more attractive, safer, to withdraw than to stand in the world and perceive. This knowing takes enormous courage. This is her path. The path of Mary/Sophia. Patrick concluded with a recommendation of further reading: Isis Mary Sophia by Rudolf Steiner.