Extreme fluctuating weather patterns, the budding of forsythia and japonica bushes and of course, the proverbial “first robin of the year,” are all official harbingers of Spring! It all generates a spirit of rejuvenation, new life and new hope, unparalleled with any other season.
“If a new Springtime failed to appear, the earth would become desolate and life extinct for with it comes the clearing away of dead and other accumulated debris from the past,” reads a passage from the Baha’i Holy Scriptures for this New Day. There from also derives a common thought of Spring cleaning also of minds.
The dire need for Spring cleaning of minds and morals is becoming increasingly adversely affected by loosening morals with the perpetual poisoning and demoralization of society from earliest age, through technological advancement(?) in all facets of the media. This is also representative among the innumerable right discoveries made through time and technology being used instead for all the wrong reasons. As the character of any community, state or nation can never be better than the individuals who comprise it, it would behoove each of us to seriously engage in personal and moral spring cleaning of debris of those actions and attitudes that impede our mental and spiritual progress. It requires daily prayers and meditation, reinforced by deliberate supportive actions!
For many decades I attempted to perfect what I termed “the art of hating without hurting,” only to finally come to grips with the fact, “there’s no such thing!” Coupling this with the realization that hate is the primary “..acid “that does more damage to the vessel in which it is stored than to the objects on which it is poured.” I was finally able to put new impetus into purifying myself of that poison as, “Love and hate cannot abide in the same abode,” we are assured in the Baha’i Holy Writings.
In supplicating the Baha’i Prayer, that begins, “O God, refresh and gladden my spirit, purify my heart, illumine my powers; I lay all my affairs in Thy hands…” I was challenged by a dear Baha’i friend, “Do you know for what you’re praying? Purification is a painful process!”
My mind immediately soared to the purification process I had to use weekly while publishing The Tribune before computers! The hot medal used to set the type then was continuously reused by dumping it into a pot and firing it up to liquifying degrees at which point the dirt and dross would float to the top and be easily skimmed off, leaving the medal glittered pure and stainless.
O friends! Must we be fired to such extent for purification?“ Each Spring season” of this new century offers mankind another virtual Spiritual Springtime when the intellectual world and the world of the soul become more verdant and pure, resuscitating the entire world of existence while bringing closer the Day when international peace, as in Springtime, will flood the entire earth with its light of life and UNITY! (Investigate! 1-800-22UNITE)
