11: A Hound of Heaven

11

A Hound of Heaven

Letters to Ascended Master

St. Padre Pio,

Friday, August 12, 2011

6: 50 A. M.

Dear Padre,

          In my last letter I wrote something that I have to explore, because it will help to explain why spiritual seekers are driven the way they are and so hard to understand. I wrote: “Nobody can understand a hound of heaven but another hound of heaven.”

          We’ve all heard the expression “it takes one to know one.” That’s because they have a similar state of consciousness, or a similar frequency of vibrations if you will. They resonate with their own kind, and a spiritual seeker has the consciousness of a spiritual seeker, which is why only a hound of heaven can understand a hound of heaven.

          But that doesn’t explain what a hound of heaven is, though; all it tells us is that spiritual seekers are different from the rest of the world. What makes them different, that’s the question? What made me different? What made you different, Padre?

For that matter, what made the author of the new book (The Gifts of Responsibility) that you brought into my life yesterday different, because from what I’ve read so far I’d say that this author is a hound of heaven?

          I was driving home from Midland yesterday when I got the sudden urge to drive into Barrie to visit my friend at her bookstore. I picked up coffee at Tim Hortons on Bayfield for us, and as I sat behind the counter talking with my friend the author of The Gifts of Responsibility came into the store to drop off four copies of her newly published book for my friend to sell in her store. She also had a bag of used books that she wanted to sell to my friend, and as she put them onto the counter the title of one book jumped out at me—The Disappearance of the Universe, by Gary R. Reynard, the book I couldn’t finish reading because I felt that something wasn’t right about the information passed on to the author by the “Ascended Masters,” and which you confirmed when I pressed you in one of my spiritual healing sessions. You said this book “poisoned the mind.”

          I made a negative comment about this book that I regret making, because you told me to be careful about how I talked about this book, and this automatically put the lady on the defensive; but it did initiate a conversation, and we ended up exchanging our newly published books; she gave me a copy of her book The Gifts of Responsibility, and I gave her a copy of my book Keeper of the Flame.

Now tell me what you think of this, Padre. I honestly believe that Providence had us meet and exchange our books because we both have something to learn from each other. She will get something from Keeper of the Flame that she needs, and I will get something from The Gifts of Responsibility that I need—and which I am getting in fact, because I’m half way through her book and I love what I’ve read so far.

Last night as I was going to sleep I got an image of being in the womb of her soul. Her book is the story of how she expanded her Roman Catholic faith to include what can simply be called a New Age spiritual perspective on life, and the impression that her book made upon me was translated into the image of being in the womb of her soul; which told me that she’s in the process of creating her own spiritual identity, and the next stage of her journey is to give birth to her spiritual self.

She’s a hound of heaven that has been “clasped” by the Hand of God and will not rest until she gives birth to her spiritual self; and I was a hound of heaven that was “clasped” by the Hand of God and gave birth to my spiritual self. As I wrote in Keeper of the Flame, I gave birth to my spiritual self in my mother’s kitchen while she was kneading bread dough on the kitchen table; so I think that Providence had us meet because we have something for each other. What that would be, I don’t know; but I believe it to be so.

And I think she would agree with this, because this is what she wrote in The Gifts of Responsibility: “There are no coincidences, only synchronicity. Once we have understood and mastered this cosmic phenomenon (karma), life will no longer be perceived as a struggle. The possibilities of unending adventures comprised of many moments in time will appear as part of a cosmic reality we can refer to as Divine Orchestration” (p. 5).

So, Padre; I know that you orchestrated our meeting, because she’s a Roman Catholic who expanded her faith to include the many dimensions of spirituality, as I have done, and we have something to learn from each other, and I thank you for bringing us together. But to get back to the point of this letter, what exactly defines a hound of heaven?

When you said “I want to inebriate myself with pain,” I understood exactly what you meant, because that resonated with me; but to explain this would be like trying to explain the color blue to a person born blind. It can’t be done; which is why my mentor Gurdjieff said that there is only self-initiation into the mysteries of life.

Nonetheless, I will try to come to an understanding by way of analogy. Take a person who is addicted. He cannot help himself. He has to have his fix, be it alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, sex, or whatever. In like manner, a hound of heaven has to have his fix also, which is God.

A hound of heaven craves God, and he will get his God fix wherever he can, which is why Francis Thompson calls him a hound of heaven. Like the hound that has caught the scent of God, he will not rest until he finds God. “Rise, clasp My hand, and come!” says God, and the hound of heaven has no choice but to come to God!

When a soul is called by God, it becomes a seeker—or, as the poet calls him, a hound of heaven. This is why you wanted to inebriate yourself with pain—because in your pain you sacrificed yourself for Jesus, and in your sacrifice you got your God fix, which in one of my healing sessions you called your “glory.” I understood that, Padre.

My spiritual sensitive who channeled you didn’t understand, because she was not addicted to God like we were; but in our addiction to God we separated ourselves from the rest of the world. This is why you said to me, “We’re very much alike.”

You got your God fix through self-sacrifice, and I got my God fix by “working” on myself as I lived the Way. I had to be very resourceful to feed my habit, but I became so frantic when I couldn’t get enough of God that I fell for an offshoot Christian solar cult teaching that promised the Logos with the solar techniques, because the God-force was said to be imbued with the rays of the sun. I was so desperate for my God fix that I didn’t care if this was true or not, and I enrolled in this teaching and practiced the solar techniques for three years when I began to feel the effects on my eyes. I went to an ophthalmologist, and the rest is history, which I may write about in a novel one day.

I have a feeling that you want me to write this story, don’t you? That’s why I thought about an early draft of my novel “The Sunworshipper” the other day; but we can talk about this some other time. The point I wanted to make with this letter is that unless one is called by God he will never understand what it means to be a hound of heaven.

That’s all I have to say for now, except that I have a dentist appointment at noon and would like you to accompany me because I dread going to the dentist.

I remain,

Your faithful companion,

Orest

10: The River of God

10

The River Of God

Letters to Ascended Master

St. Padre Pio,

Thursday, August 11,2011

8: 45 A. M.

Dear Padre,

          Okay, Penny and I thought it over and this morning decided that I should go ahead with a new blog; but Penny wasn’t comfortable with the title that I had chosen for my book of letters to you, so we tried a variety of titles until we came upon one that we both agreed upon: The River Of God, Private Letters to Ascended Master St. Padre Pio. “There,” she said; “now you can have your cake and eat it, too.”

          She said that because I wanted to keep “Ascended Master” in my title, which she didn’t like (she still can’t wrap her head around my relationship with you, but she’s going with it), and she wanted the word “personal” in the title, but we settled on “private” because it’s catchier. What do you think?

          Penny thought the image of a river would catch the reader’s attention, and I agreed because it makes reference to the River of God that you spoke about in my spiritual healing sessions, the image of the Divine Current that flows from God to create life and carry soul back home to God.

          You went into more detail, though. You used the image of one placing a big stone in the River of God, which impeded the flow of the Divine Current in his life, like the huge boulder that I had created with my spiritual conceit that impeded the flow of the Divine Current in my life—hence, my spiritual healing brought about by your sanctifying grace!

          I’ve thanked you already for my spiritual healing, Padre; but I’d like to thank you again because my sessions with you changed my life. Like I said to my friend at her bookstore yesterday, “I feel such an enormous relief since my healing sessions with Padre Pio. You don’t realize how heavy ego can be until you’re relieved of its weight upon your soul. Honest to God, I think ego has to be the most burdensome thing in the world!”

          I wanted to puke at the thought of my pre-Padre Pio life; that’s how disgusted I was with my own spiritual conceit. Had I not been slain by your humility I would still be out there blindly strutting my stuff like the spiritual peacock that I was! This reminds me of the comment made by the Spiritual Traveler Rebazar Tarzs about Jesus strutting his stuff like a peacock—not to compare myself with Jesus, though. God forbid!

          No, all I want to do is show that we are all blind to our own vanity—our own “stone” in the River of God that impedes the flow of the Divine Current of Love in our life, and I’m sure that Jesus had his moments.

That’s what the River of God is, an endless current of Love that flows from God and back to God. Jesus called it the “water of everlasting life,” and as it flows from God it creates and sustains life, and as it flows back to God it awakens and returns soul back home a spiritually self-realized, God conscious soul ready to serve in the Divine Plan of God as you are doing by helping souls on their journey through life.

Padre, how did you know that you would do more to help mankind from Heaven than you were doing in your humble role as a Capuchin monk who said Mass every morning and listened to over one hundred confessions every day, not to mention your personal response to the many letters that people wrote you, when you were allowed to respond that is?

Your superiors, whom you obeyed absolutely because of your vow of obedience, denied you this precious gift of service for a period of time; but I don’t want to get into that here. Suffice to say that I know how much you had to suffer to serve your fellow man, but serve you did; and now you are serving from the Other Side in your capacity as an Ascended Master, and I can’t thank you enough for bringing me together with my spiritual sensitive who channeled you so we could do a book on spiritual healing. And when I asked if we would meet again, you said, “Our work is not yet done, my son.”

Did you “anticipate” this book of letters? I did ask if we would be doing another book with my spiritual sensitive and you said yes, and I even caught a glimpse of the theme of this new project which was inspired by Ecclesiastes; but it never occurred to me to write you a series of letters until a few weeks ago when I was reading on our front deck.

The thought came to me out of the blue, but I know that you planted that seed in my mind, and it didn’t take long to take root because I’ve always wanted to write a book of letters. And just the other night as Penny and I were doing our spiritual contemplation you planted the seed in my mind to create a new blog for my letters and share them with the public before I publish them in book form!

Once again, I had no thought of posting them on a blog site. That idea came to me out of the blue also, and I know you gave it to me; so Penny and I have decided to go ahead with it, and when she comes back from her trip up north where she’s going for her niece’s wedding (and to visit her father), she will create my new blog site for me because I don’t have a clue how to go about it and I can begin posting my letters to you. Are you happy now?

When you’re called to serve, you’re called aren’t you? I almost feel like I felt when I caught my first scent of the Way and had to follow it like the hound of Heaven in Thompson’s poem. I had to go wherever the scent took me, and believe me it took me to places that taught me lessons I will never forget—like that offshoot Christian solar cult teaching brought into the world by a “Child Christ” that did damage to my eyesight! But I can’t bring myself to talk about that now.

Strangely enough however, the thought came to me just yesterday to dig out my old manuscript of the novel that I started to write on my experience with this Christian solar cult teaching that I studied for three years.

I never think about this novel, because the thought of reliving that experience horrifies me. I called it “The Sunworshipper,” but the thought came to me yesterday to write it as the main story in a book of short stories, and it was strong enough for me almost go to the basement and dig up my manuscript; so I guess you just planted the seed for now. But it would make a great story because it would reveal how far one will go to find his way back home to God—like risking one’s eyesight as I did by burning three holes in the retina of my eyes with the solar techniques that this teaching taught to ingest the Logos supposedly imbued with the rays of the sun!

Wow! I still cringe at my experience. I couldn’t write this novel because I couldn’t relive the trauma of that whole experience, especially with my ophthalmologist who was so angry with me for doing those solar techniques that he dismissed me from his examining room and I had to fly down to the eye clinic in Waterloo for the appointment that my brother had arranged for me to find out how much damage I had done to my eyes.

 But how could I explain to the ophthalmologist at the Thunder Bay Clinic the power of the Call of God? I could have asked him to read Thompson’s poem “The Hound of Heaven,” but what good would that have done? Nobody can understand a “hound of heaven” but another “hound of heaven.” “Rise, clasp my Hand, and come!” God commands, and I paid a dear price to be clasped by the Hand of God—as did you, Padre. God, I can’t begin to fathom the pain you suffered for fifty years with the stigmata; but that was your choice. You did ask Jesus how you could serve his mission, and he gave you his five crucifixion wounds, and you embraced la via d’sofferenza so passionately that you said, “I want to inebriate myself with pain.” But why, the reader may ask? Why would one be so foolish to suffer like that? Where’s the logic?

We could tell them, couldn’t we? But I think I’ll wait for another letter when I can delve into the mystery of what you called your “glory” and I came to call “virtue” and Jesus called “treasures in heaven.”

Indeed, the River of God has as many streams as there are souls in God’s Kingdom. As you said, “life is a journey of the self.” But mercifully, every stream will eventually find its way back into the River of God and flow back to the Godhead—eureka!

Didn’t I say at the beginning of this project that my book of letters would find its own theme? Well, it just popped up—the River of God! This theme speaks to everyone, and I do believe that this is going to be the final title to my book of letters to Ascended Master St. Padre Pio!

I remain,

Your faithful companion,

Orest

9: The Many Dimensions Of Spirituality

 9

The Many Dimensions of Spirituality

Letters to Ascended Master

St. Padre Pio,

Wednesday, Aug.10, 2011

6:10 A.M.

Dear Padre,

         

          While Penny and I were doing our spiritual contemplation last night, the thought came to me to post my letters to you on a blog. I already have a blog for my spiritual musings, but the thought came through loud and clear to post my letters to you. Did you plant this thought?

          I ran it by Penny, and after our spiritual contemplation she read my first two letters to you and smiled, then chuckled because she found them rather revealing, especially when I talk about my propensity to procrastinate. “You should read this letter every week to remind yourself,” she said, and laughed. Thank goodness for her patience.

          I’ve decided to think about it. I don’t want to jump right in because it would mean a commitment. I have the pressure of writing a spiritual musing every week on top of working on my current novel and getting my first book of musings ready to be published, so before I commit myself to posting my letters to you on a new blog site I’d like to have at least twenty or so letters already written so I don’t put myself behind the eight ball.

          Last night when I went to sleep I asked if I could meet you in my dreams. “Give me something interesting for my letters,” I said, hoping to entice you into my dreams; but I should know better.

          Spirit does what Spirit wills, and all I can hope for is a happy coincidence of my will coinciding with Spirit’s will. In any event, Penny and I talked over the possibilities of posting my Padre Pio letters and we think it would be a great way to get more exposure; but more importantly, it would offer Christian readers an outside-the-box perspective on the many dimensions of spirituality.

          But the question is, do they want to know about the many dimensions of spirituality? I get the feeling they don’t. I can’t help but feel that people today are in a very strange place, consciousness wise. They are being forced to wake up because of world events, but the responsibility that comes with greater consciousness forces them to try to stay asleep a little longer, spiritually speaking. There’s a great resistance to acknowledge what’s going on in the world. I was rereading The Only Planet of Choice yesterday, and the spokesman for the Nine Enlightened Beings said that we are all individually responsible for the state of the world, but this is too much for people to bear, and so they prefer not to wake up; hence, the obsessive preoccupation with the little self.

          “It is because people are frightened to find out who they really are,” said Tom, the spokesman for the Nine Enlightened Beings, “for when they know that completely, they feel the responsibility is too great” (p. 269).

This fear of self-knowledge keeps people spiritually asleep.

          But to keep the world from self-destruction, we have to wake up and “remove self from self,” said Tom, which we also discussed in my chapter “The Selfless Self” in Healing with Padre Pio; but this is not a concept that will soon catch fire because the self is much too entrenched in its own needs, desires, and daily struggles. Indeed, life has to get very difficult before people wake up to their spiritual responsibility to themselves and the world at large. I’m sure we can expect more catastrophes and political upheavals.

          So should I post my letters? I have one concern that bothers me (aside from how readers might respond to this literary exercise), and that has to do with maintaining the integrity of my letters, because you can rest assured that I will have one eye on my reader as I open myself up to you.

It’s my intention to open up my heart to you with these letters, because I want to grow in spirit, and there’s no better way to grow in spirit than to open up one’s heart; fear however may keep me from being as frank as I want to be.

          Indeed, fear is the bugaboo of spiritual growth, isn’t it? We have to talk about this in my next book with you. I don’t know when this is going to be. I thought we would be starting it next spring, but it looks more like next fall or winter now because I have to get Healing with Padre Pio out before we begin our next project with my spiritual sensitive who channeled you, and I don’t think we can get it out before spring. But it’s all choreographed from above, isn’t it Padre? So why worry?

          Just do what we have to do and let the day unfold. That seems to be the way to live in the Moment. I only wish it were as simple as that. Maybe it is. Maybe I’m just not getting it. I’d sure love to meet someone who lives in the Moment. Maybe I’ve already met them and did not recognize that they live in the Moment. What would characterize them?

          I’m doing a lot of blathering this morning, aren’t I? I have to leave at 7:30 for an eight o’clock appointment at Canadian Tire in Midland for my van. I blew my muffler the other day. I may need a whole new tailpipe, I don’t know; but this is the third thing that’s happened to me that is going to cost us.

          I may have cracked a tooth a two weeks ago, because I still can’t bite on it; so I have a dentist appointment this Friday and may be looking at a root canal. We don’t have a dental plan, so there’s an unexpected expense, and our lawn tractor broke down and is getting repaired. We had work done on it last year to the tune of six hundred dollars, and it’s only four years old. I know, that’s life; but does it have to gang up on us?

Same day, 7 P.M….

            Padre, I got a break on my muffler. I didn’t blow my muffler, or my tailpipe; they had to replace a flange that had rusted out. Labor and material came to $111.00, which is far better than what I expected; and I had an interesting experience while waiting for my van.

          A customer waiting for his vehicle, whose name was Don, talked about his life. It started with my comment about getting a break on my muffler, which opened the door for how many times he had been “screwed royally” in his life (great material for my book Old Whore Life), and I listened to his incredible story of misadventure for half an hour or more, and what a story it was! But throughout his story, he kept telling me that he could not compromise himself—which cost him his military career!

I told him he should write a novel.

          “Yeah, everybody tells me that,” he said, but I think the whole point of me being there with him was to let him experience your presence with me, and I know you will be working on him now; so, Padre, I did my part and introduced him to your energy, and I wish him the best on his journey through life.

          Then I drove into Barrie to visit my friend at her bookstore, and guess what? I ended up exchanging my novel Keeper of the Flame with a clinical psychologist from Wasaga Beach who was dropping off some copies of her own book to sell on consignment. Her book is called The Gifts of Responsibility, and from her bio I learned that she was a Roman Catholic who expanded the horizons of her faith. Her book interests me very much, and I will share my feelings with you when I’ve read it. Incidentally, Padre, I think you brought this book into my life for my spiritual growth.

          I also had a long conversation in the bookstore with two other ladies, one in her fifties and the other in her eighties, and for some reason both needed to make the point that they had to be true to themselves—which brought to mind what I said this morning about meeting people who live in the Moment. Did I get my answer? Do we live in the Moment by being true to ourselves? Is this the message you tried to give me today with all these people who talked about how they had to be true to themselves?

I’ll have to do a spiritual musing on this…

I remain,

Your faithful companion,

Orest

8: Actions Speak Louder Than Words

8

Actions Speak Louder Than Words

Letters to Ascended Master

St. Padre Pio,

Sunday, August 7, 2011

5:35 A. M.

Dear Padre,

          Yesterday Penny and I attended our monthly Spiritual Discourse class in Washago, which is just north of Orillia. We usually attend these classes in Orillia, but a member of our group wanted to hold a potluck lunch after our class at her place by the river in Washago, so we decided to hold the class there also yesterday, and it was a beautiful day.

          We didn’t know what we were going to bring for potluck lunch. Penny thought of making a Wisconsin Strawberry Pie (she had just made one for my birthday), but she opted for a big bowl of potato salad instead, enough for a dozen people; and I decided to make Italian Bruschetta for an appetizer because I had picked up a basket of fresh field tomatoes at Johnson’s Market in Midland, and I sliced up enough French baguette so everyone could have at least two pieces of Bruschetta.

          Penny made her potato salad the night before, and I made the Bruschetta early Saturday morning because I had to toast the slices of baguette.

          We held our class outdoors in the back yard overlooking the river with the occasional pontoon boat and canoe floating up or down the river, and it was one of the best classes we’ve ever had. There were the seven regular members in our class, plus one guest from southern Ontario who was a friend of the lady hosting the potluck (she had been invited to stay the weekend), and there was plenty of discussion on the Spiritual Discourse.

          After the class we served ourselves the potluck buffet. There was no main entrée, because no one had brought one (the hostess’s contribution to the potluck was a very small chocolate cake), one lady brought a small pasta salad, another lady with a giving heart brought a specially prepared rice dish and plate of veggies and dip (she’s on a strict diet for health reasons and just wanted to make sure she would have something she could eat), Penny had potato salad, I added my Bruschetta, and the hostess’s husband went out and bought some fresh corn while we were doing our class and his wife steamed half a dozen cut in half immediately after class, another lady brought a small bowl of fruit salad made of chunks of watermelon and a few blueberries and fewer strawberries, and the last member of the class, who is a newcomer to the teaching, didn’t bring anything; and there was water, tea, and coffee for beverages. That was it.

          Padre, I don’t know how to broach this subject without pushing some buttons (which I think deserve to be pushed), but I have to because it speaks to the nature of love—or, more precisely, to the paucity of love.

If you remember in my last letter (“What Does Love Look Like?”) I quoted the Monks of New Skete who said, “love looks like generosity,” but generosity is not a virtue that Penny and I have witnessed very often since we moved to Georgian Bay. In fact, it is so well hidden that I don’t think people would recognize it if they saw it; or, rather, to be perfectly honest, they would be shocked by it—as Penny and I witnessed when we held a potluck harvest turkey dinner at our house for the members of our spiritual community the first year we moved here. They couldn’t believe their eyes.

This quality about people that we have witnessed more often than we would care to admit—I don’t know what to call it, perhaps thrift, cheapness, parsimony of spirit—never ceases to astonish us. What would it have taken to barbeque a few hot dogs as a main entrée for our potluck lunch after class? The cost would’ve been minimal, and it was a great day for a barbeque by the river. Even boiled hot dogs. Or lasagna as a main entrée would have gone a long way to satisfying the guests. I’ve picked up lasagnas on sale for Penny and myself for well under ten dollars, and one would have been enough to feed our whole class. That wouldn’t have been asking too much, would it?

As Penny said, the host has an obligation; but that doesn’t seem to apply for some people. Another time we attended a potluck lunch at another member of our spiritual community’s house, also in Washago on the same river before she relocated to southern Ontario after her husband died, and she had a small package of twelve tiny stuffed pastry appetizers for her contribution to the potluck lunch. Thank goodness some members brought enough for everybody. Penny brought a pot full of homemade cabbage rolls, but the hostess didn’t want to turn on the oven to heat them up because it was going to use up too much electricity and Penny had to heat them in a frying pan. And yet, our spiritual path is supposed to be about love!

“Love spends itself willingly for others, be it with time, attention, money, or simply concern,” said the Monks of New Skete—which reminds me of the little incident of how you showed your love one day when you mentioned to your doctor friend (Dr. Mario De Giacomo) that you were fond of spaghetti ala napoletana the way your mother made it and it had been years since you had it last, and out of his great love for you your doctor friend had a lady prepare you a nice big plate and he brought it to you the next day; but as much as you wanted to eat it, you asked your doctor friend to give it to one of the poor peasants who would enjoy the meal much more than you.

Padre, your little sacrifice of the simple plate of one of your favorite dishes speaks to the generosity of your soul, and for my money it was an act of pure grace. That’s what love is supposed to look like!

I don’t want to say any more about the paucity of love that Penny and I have witnessed down here, especially in our own spiritual community (an irony difficult to support because it begs judgment), except for one little point that Penny made at our class. “Love comes from the heart, not the mouth,” she said.

 Indeed, actions speak louder than words!

I remain,

Your faithful companion,

Orest

7: What Does Love Look Like?

7

What Does Love Look Like?

Letters to Ascended Master

St. Padre Pio,

Monday, August 1, 2011

7:40 A. M.

Dear Padre,

          I’ve just been re-reading the chapter “What Does Love Look Like” in the book In the Spirit of Happiness, by the Monks of New Skete, because I wanted to refresh my memory so I could write a spiritual musing on this fascinating question, but for some reason I feel like sharing my thoughts on love with you; hence my letter this morning.

          I can’t get the memory of my neighbor’s three young boys, especially the two youngest ones, out of my mind. The boys came up with their mother to their family cottage next door (the cottage is shared by her two siblings and young families), but the boys spent much of their time on our front deck with me.

          I love reading on our front deck, so I’ve been spending a lot of time there in the summers since my bypass operation three years ago. Before my bypass I had to work my trade of drywall taping and painting because summer was my busiest time of year, but I’m only picking up small jobs now and I spend many summer afternoons on my deck reading books that I’m called upon to read—like In the Spirit of Happiness, which I felt compelled to read for my book of letters to you, Padre; so the boys would see me on the deck and come over to visit, and talk, and share, and play.

          I mention this because it was like the boys, especially the two young ones, Luca (six) and Christian (two), just couldn’t get enough of my energy. They wanted to touch me and sit on me and be around me. I said to Penny, “I’ve got my spiritual gravitas back!”

 That’s how I used to attract children when I was loaded with spiritual energy when I was consumed by my spiritual quest for my true self and employed every technique I could to gather and collect spiritual energy, because I had learned that to be my true self I had to grow in my true self, and to grow in my true self I had to harness all the spiritual energy that I could get and I harnessed so much energy that I attracted children like flowers attracted bees. One seven year old boy even came down to my house one evening after dinner and knocked on our door and asked my mother if I could come out to play!

This was the most endearing gesture of innocence that I have ever experienced, and this is what the young boys next door reminded me of every time they walked over to be with me on the front deck. But so intrigued was I by their attraction to my energy that I asked Penny, “Why does my energy attract children and repel most adults?”

“It’s their innocence,” she said. “They don’t have anything to hide from you. Most adults have something to hide, and they can’t stand to be around you because your energy threatens their falseness.”

I had to agree with her. In fact, something you said at one of my spiritual healing sessions confirmed this. Remember? I asked you why I affected one member of my spiritual community the way I did. “She has a hate on for me like you wouldn’t believe,” I said, and you replied that it was because I saw something in her that she did not want to face up to, and I threatened what she pretended to be—i.e., a kind, and loving person. Which brings me right back to the theme of this letter—what does love look like?

“Love looks like generosity,” said Father Laurence. “It spends itself willingly (and wisely) for others, be it with time, attention, money, or simply concern” (In the Spirit of Happiness, 255). That’s the face of love that I would like to explore in my letter this morning, and the woman that I threatened is a perfect example of the kind of person who makes out like she’s all about love but her behavior speaks otherwise. 

Didn’t Jesus say, “Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them?” (Math. 7: 20). Well, I listened to what this woman had to say and then observed her behavior. She loved to humiliate her husband in public at our spiritual functions until I finally called her up on it, telling her to keep her marital dynamic private and not bring it to our functions; and I also told her how gauche it was to bring her own food into a restaurant, which she often did after one of our spiritual functions. As the saying goes, she did not walk her talk. I saw through her, and she hated me for it.

Of course, you told me to be more accepting, kinder in my response to her, and not embarrass her the way I did by challenging her, and I took your advice. Not that I wanted to, but because I knew that this was all part of my own spiritual healing—which culminated in your devastating humility slaying my overwhelming spiritual conceit!

In any event, the point I want to make is that the face of love that I wanted to explore this morning speaks to the generosity of love, which is a face that I’m very familiar with because I learned a long time ago that giving of oneself—be it in time, concern, or coin—is one of the most satisfying ways to grow spiritually, and one of the most obvious.

I can always tell if a person has love in their heart by how they give of themselves, and I’ve come to the conclusion that the cheaper one is (in their time, concern, or coin) the less love they have in their heart. For me, this is a mathematical certainty!

That’s all for today, Padre. I hope I didn’t invite a new spiritual lesson here, as I often do when I speak my mind so frankly.

I remain,

Your faithful companion,

Orest

6: Walking A Tightrope With Padre Pio

6

Walking A Tightrope With Padre Pio

Letters to Ascended Master

St. Padre Pio,

Sunday, July 31, 2011

9: 50 A. M.

Dear Padre,

I just finished writing a spiritual musing (“A New Species Of Man: Homo Luminous”) for my book Old Whore Life, And Other Spiritual Musings, which I will be posting on my blog first, but I still feel spiritually restless; hence, my letter to you this morning.

Before the spirit of this letter carries me away though, let me thank you for coming to my aid the other night. I was beseeched by that sexual consciousness that I am prone to every once in a while (I was living in France in my early twenties and I accidentally opened up the chakra at the base of my spine while meditating one evening and awakened the kundalini energy, and I’ve had issues with my sexual energy ever since; thank goodness I learned to sublimate it through Gurdjieff’s teaching of “work on oneself” and creative writing), and I repeated one of my power mantras (which includes your name) to safeguard me from the temptations of my libidinous consciousness (which in your lifetime you called these temptations “the devil” and now call one’s “demons”), and I felt immediate relief from the downward pull of these unconscious desires; so, thank you.

In all honesty, I had no idea that you would become such a big part of my life when I started my project Healing with Padre Pio. I did not expect for you to be always present in my life. But being one with Holy Spirit, it was only logical that you would be with me all the time because I asked for your help for my spiritual healing; and I’m grateful now that you are always with me because you affect spiritual change in me that would otherwise take a long time to realize without you, for such is my resonance with you!

I did laugh however when you told me that I didn’t have to be so much on my guard that I would be too afraid to live my life. You said my consciousness of your presence in my life was like walking a tightrope, and that I should not be afraid to fall off every now and then; and you know what, that’s exactly how I feel I’m living my life now—on a tightrope!

And I was afraid of falling off the other night. That’s why I called for your help. And instantly I felt your energy drive away my sexual demons. What a relief that was!

Now, perhaps I should explore this whole concept of being assailed by one’s demons. First, what are one’s demons anyway?

My perception is that one’s demons are archetypal energies that have merged to form a matrix of unconscious ego-energy (what Carl Jung called our shadow) that seeks to feed off our conscious ego energies by forcing us to give them expression; hence, the more we give in to our demons, the more power our unconscious self has over us.

In other words, our demons are of our own making; although, we do inherit many of these archetypal patterns from our parents. This is what is meant by the sins of the parents being visited upon the children and grandchildren.

It is not the sins of our parents as such that are passed on to us, but the archetypal patterns of their sins—or, to express it differently, their shadow becomes a part of our shadow, or unconscious self.

So as we resolve our shadow self, we help our parents in their growth to spiritual enlightenment. What a mystery life is, isn’t it Padre? But we just keep plugging along. I think that’s all I want to say for today…

I remain,

Your faithful companion,

Orest

5: Experiencing The Holy Now With My Neighbor

5

Experiencing The Holy Now

With My Neighbor

Letters to Ascended Master

St. Padre Pio,

Thursday, July 28, 2011

9: 25 A. M.

Dear Padre,

          I don’t know if I’m reading too much into this, perhaps because I wish it to be true, but I think yesterday you gave me a deeper glimpse into my insight into the hypersynchronistic potential of my life (i.e., approaching the Holy Now) with an experience with my next door neighbor who brought her three children up to the family cottage.

          Her three children are boys, the youngest two, the other six, and the oldest ten. I went bike riding with the two older boys one evening, and the next day the middle boy came over to the house to ask if we could go bike riding again, and we did; and later as I was reading on my front deck, the three boys came over to join me.

          Their mother speaks Italian fluently, and I asked her the day before if she could write in Italian, which she can; so I wanted to know if she could translate a couple of short paragraphs into Italian for my novel Healing with Padre Pio. These were the two questions that I asked you in my poor Italian dialect in one of my spiritual healing sessions.

          She said she would, and I told her I’d bring them over the next day, or day after. I didn’t want to impose on her right away. I wanted her to enjoy her first few days at the cottage with her kids.

          After dinner last night I was on the front deck reading Lost Books Of The Bible, by William Hone (the books that were left out of the Bible; I was reading St. Paul’s Letters that were not included in the Bible) when I heard the boys outside. They had just finished dinner and had come out to play.

          Their two cousins, both girls, had come to the cottage with their mother, just for the day, and they were all excited to be together and wanted to get as much play time in together before the mother and girls left that evening. They had to return early because they were moving into their new house and a lot had to be done. The girls were not happy to be moving to a new neighborhood in Toronto because they would miss their friends.

          In any event Padre, as I was sitting there the thought occurred to me to drop over with the two paragraphs that I wanted translated, because I thought that the two sisters could work on it together and give me the best translation possible; so I got my paper and walked over.

          Of course, I had to explain what I wanted translated, which entailed telling them about my spiritual healing sessions with you; but they weren’t as shocked as I thought they would be. They’re Roman Catholic, with a very deep faith in their religion that got badly shaken when their father died of cancer five years ago. 

The whole family was angry at God because they did not think it was fair for their father to be taken so early, and their anger had not gone away yet, which gave me the opportunity to introduce the concepts of karma and reincarnation that I expound upon in Healing with Padre Pio; and after I told them about how my Medical Intuitive, who is a spiritual sensitive (a modern term for psychic) channeled you for my sessions, one of the girls told me about their parish priest who was also spiritually gifted and who left  his parish church to go to a smaller parish where he was “called” to pursue his gift by doing “healing Masses” for parishioners.

This priest married my neighbor and her husband, who had a near-fatal car accident and who swears that St. Anthony saved his life. In fact, when their priest was counseling them for marriage he saw that St. Anthony was in the room with the young man, and he commented on the Saint’s presence; so the young man told him about his accident and how his mother prayed to St. Anthony to spare his life. This story made it easier for me to share my experience with you, Padre, and it also gave me the opportunity to give the girls a copy of my new novel Keeper of the Flame, which is sure to expand their spiritual horizons.

Now I can make my point, which I hope is not too tenuous (for me, it’s not; but for the reader it might appear that I am trying to pour the ocean into a teacup), and it is this: While standing at the kitchen sink doing the dishes, the mother of the three boys was telling her sister what wonderful neighbors Penny and I were, how lucky they were to have us for neighbors, and she was wondering what she could do for us—and just then I appeared at the door with my two paragraphs for her to translate into Italian!

Coincidence? I think not. I think this experience was proof of what I am beginning to see as the Holy Now—that mystifying concept of “singularity” that Jesus tries to explain to Glenda Green in her book Love Without End, Jesus Speaks: —

 “Due to the one spirit and the highly integrated, synchronistic nature of all existence, there is an aspect of singularity, although it is not a particle or point. It is a function of hypersynchronicity which can compress any or every part of existence to a singular state of infinite potential. Thus, ‘singularity’ as an aspect of separation does not exist. Separation is not honored to that degree” (p. 289).

This is such a deep concept that it is beyond my comprehension, and yet I think that I do perceive it; and my experience with my neighbor was your way of giving me proof that I am approaching the Holy Now—the Eternal Present, which is accessed by hypersynchronstic experiences like my experience with my neighbor when she thought of something she could do for her wonderful neighbors and I showed up at her door at precisely that moment with the paragraphs that I wanted her to translate for me!

          Was existence, hers and mine, compressed to a point of singularity? Did we experience the Holy Now where cause and effect were one? Was this a moment of “perfect stasis,” as Jesus explained it: —

          “The universe is implicitly and explicitly of one piece. At the point of perfect stasis between the implicit and explicit, there is a condition of hypersynchronicity where matter, energy, space, and time move into a ‘no-resistance’ mode of infinite potential. This is not the collapse of matter. This is the synchronizing of it to a ‘zero point’ of perfect stasis. (Stasis, He explained, is the perfect repose of hypersynchronicity.) Understand that ‘zero point’ is not about ‘nothingness.’ It’s a designation of infinity” (p. 287).     

          Isn’t this “designation of infinity” the Holy Now, the Eternal Present, that place where cause and effect are one?

          This is deep stuff, Padre; but I think that these letters have opened me up to a greater flow of Divine Spirit, and my doors of perception have been opened enough for me to catch a glimpse of the Holy Now in the experiences of my daily life! Wow!

          Now that I have shared this with you (it seems foolish that I should speak like this, because you are ever-present in my life and know everything about me; but I will talk about this in another letter), let me share a dream that I had a month or so ago of being so present in the Holy Now that I became a magnet for people. I had such spiritual gravitas in my dream that people couldn’t get enough of me! In my dream, I knew that I was living in the moment—the Holy Now!

          Is the inner starting to manifest on the outer? I think so, but I don’t want to go there yet because that’s too much for me to think about. It terrifies me to know that I’m getting that close to the “singularity”!

I remain,

Your faithful companion,

Orest

4: The Whole World's Asleep

4

The Whole World’s Asleep

Letters to Ascended Master

St. Padre Pio,

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

6: 45 A. M.

Dear Padre,

          I finished reading In the Spirit of Happiness by the Monks of New Skete yesterday, my favorite chapter being “What Does Love Look Like,” which I’m going to pursue in another letter or spiritual musing, or both, but this morning I want to share with you my thoughts on something that the Seeker (who is a composite character made up of pilgrims who went to New Skete) said to Father Laurence, the founder of the Orthodox Catholic monastic order of New Skete in Cambridge, New York.

          The Seeker had corresponded with Father Laurence and wanted to meet him in person, so he flew to New York to visit New Skete, and Father Laurence picked him up at the airport. On the drive to the monastery, Father said, “How about telling me a bit about yourself,” which the Seeker did; and when he stopped talking, Father said, “And what have you learned through all of this?”

The Seeker thought before replying. Finally, he said, “I’ve learned that the whole world’s asleep—including myself.”

If I may, I’d like to explore this concept of being asleep to life, which is the dominant theme of all spiritual paths…

Jesus came into the world to wake us up from the deep sleep of life, but you really took me by surprise in one of my spiritual healing sessions when you told me that Jesus came from the future. That blew my mind!

It took a while for this to sink in, and then I asked if you would tell me where the world was headed if Jesus had to come back from the future to wake the world up from its deep sleep. Was the world headed too far off its spiritual course for it’s own good and the Spiritual Hierarchy had to intervene by sending Jesus to troubleshoot with his teaching of salvation? I asked; but you wouldn’t tell me.

You said that had to do with the finer inner workings of the universe, and it was not for me to know at this time; but now I’d like to explore this concept with you of being asleep to life, because I believe the world has veered off spiritual course again and there is a great spiritual intervention happening even as I write you this letter—which was confirmed by the book that Providence brought to my front door by my neighbor, The Only Planet of Choice, by Phyllis V. Schlemmer: the Nine Silent Ones said that the world is in danger of destroying itself. And, if I may be allowed to say this, I believe you are one of the Ascended Spiritual Masters that is intervening to help steer the world back on its spiritual course—hence, your coming to my Medical Intuitive three years ago so we could meet and work on the book Healing with Padre Pio, which will help to wake the world up from its profound spiritual stupor.

But what do I mean by “profound spiritual stupor,” because that’s how I see the world? The Seeker told Father Laurence that his searching had led him to believe that the whole world was asleep, including himself; but I see this sleep as a profound spiritual stupor. Not that there isn’t something profoundly spiritual going on in the world, which I believe there is because I am a part of this new spiritual awakening, but as I told you in one of my spiritual healing sessions, I believe the soul of the world has become much too big for the ego of the world, and something has to give—like grass growing through asphalt!

This is why the world is undergoing a spiritual cleansing with all of these natural catastrophes like earthquakes, tsunamis, violent hurricanes and floods and forest fires and droughts and crop failures and famine and world climate changes that are forcing humanity to wake up to our relationship with our environment. We simply can’t continue the way we are, because we are headed for disaster. This is what you told me these world disasters were all about—waking us up to our spiritual responsibilities!

But why this profound spiritual stupor? What’s the root cause of this deep life-sleep? Why do we refuse to wake up to life?

Padre, I’ve given this a lot of thought in my novels, and especially in my spiritual musings, and I’ve come to the conclusion that we have reached the limits of our ego potential; we simply cannot gorge ourselves any longer on the pleasures of life and expect not to pay a price for our indulgence. This is what the Nine Enlightened Ones in The Only Planet of Choice said. Earth is the only planet of desire, and man has become so greedy with desire that he has forgotten his spiritual purpose in life, so they have to intervene to wake us up to life.

This is why the world is experiencing these natural disasters. It’s the only way to wake the world up from its profound spiritual stupor. In a word, the ego of the world has gone mad and something has to give; but ego is terrified of waking up to our responsibility to the world, and it is doing all it can to stay asleep to life!

Fear is the root cause of our profound spiritual stupor; the fear of having to sacrifice some of that boundless desire and assume our spiritual responsibility to the world we have created, and I can see this profound spiritual stupor whenever I go on Facebook. I cannot believe our preoccupation with the “good life” and thousand and one struggles that this life of self-indulgence entails; and anything that threatens our spiritual stupor, we refuse to acknowledge—like my spiritual musings on “old whore life.”

But you did tell me to speak only to those who have ears for what I have to say, and which I finally understand now; so what am I to do?

I’m certainly not going to stop writing my spiritual musings, because they are a phenomenal way to tap into the higher consciousness of life and awaken the stuperous soul; but if I don’t start attracting readers who resonate with my writing—or, if you will, people like the Seeker who want to wake up to life, I am going to get pretty discouraged. Can you do anything about that? Can you start bringing those people to my books?

You did say that I shouldn’t worry about this, because it was your job and God’s job to bring readers to my books; but “at my back I hear, time’s winged chariot drawing near,” and I’d like to see some fruit for all my labor before it’s too late, if not for myself for Penny’s sake. Penny’s belief in me keeps me going, but some days can be very trying.

Enough whining. Thank you for listening, Padre. I just wanted to let you know that I’m very grateful to you for bringing the book In the Spirit of Happiness into my life. It gave me a wonderful insight into spiritual growth through a community of like-minded people.

Oh, I should mention (not that you don’t already know) that the New Skete monastic order is an offshoot of the Franciscan Order. The Capuchin Order, which you belonged to, is a Franciscan Order; and this is just another one of those little coincidences that have become so common in my life from the day I began my spiritual healing sessions with you!

In fact, so common and in greater proximity to each other are these coincidences happening in my life that I have the terrifying thought that I am approaching what Jesus called the “Holy Now” in Glenda Green’s book Love Without End, Jesus Speaks: “In the state of hypersynchronicity” (the Holy Now), cause and effect are the same. As awareness departs from the sacred point, cause and effect are observed to be complimentary…” (p. 288). Wow! Is this where I’m headed?

I remain,

Your faithful companion,

Orest

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NEXT WEEK'S LETTER: "Experiencing the Holy Now with my Neighbor." 

3: As Providence Would Have It

3

As Providence Would Have It

Letters to Ascended Master

St. Padre Pio,

Tuesday, July 25, 2011

6: 40 A. M.

Dear Padre,

          I’m writing you a letter, so I must have granted myself permission by doing a household responsibility, which I did yesterday; I finally took my long extension ladder out and removed the dead branches from one of our maple trees that a severe storm last year had broken off, and I also cut four or five other dead branches from the tree. I want to remove the whole tree, which I may do in the fall with my neighbor Tony’s help, because he has a power saw, which will leave one large healthy maple and two small maples in that clump of trees in the center of our front yard. In any event, I see this as a symbolic sign—getting rid of the dead wood in my life!

           Okay, now I can get to the reason I was dying to write to you about—the new book that I came across last week by “chance”!

          As I said in my first letter, once I begin a new book it begins to attract to itself all the relevant material it needs to realize itself, and last week I drove into Barrie to visit my friend at her bookstore and as Providence would have it, I noticed a book on the coffee table where I was sitting that caught my attention— In the Spirit of Happiness: Spiritual Wisdom for Living, by the Monks of New Skete. (I will comment on this book in future letters, because it addresses much of what you had to say to me.)

          My friend was busy placing an order of jewelry with a salesman (she sells more than used books in her New Age bookstore), so I went down the street to Tim Hortons and picked up a coffee for her, the salesman, and myself and sat down in one of her comfortable reading chairs to wait for her to finish her business; and while I waited I browsed the books that she had on the coffee table. One was In the Spirit of Happiness.

          New Skete is an Orthodox Catholic monastery in Cambridge, New York, and as I read the inside cover jacket I was immediately pulled into the book because it excited my curiosity about the monastic life. I had not read any books on the monastic life until I began reading about your life, and for some reason Providence deemed it necessary for me to become acquainted with the spiritual life of a Catholic monastic order; hence my “discovery” of In the Spirit of Happiness, by the Monks of New Skete.

          I had read a book called Hermits, by Peter Francis—with chapters on “The Desert Fathers,” “By Walden Pond: Henry David Thoreau,” “Hermit of the Sahara: Charles Foucauld,” “The Waters of Contradiction: Thomas Merton” (I read his book The Seven Storey Mountain), and other chapters that gave me wonderful insights into the life of a hermit—but In the Spirit of Happiness was an inside look at the spiritual life of a contemporary Catholic monastic order that spoke to the spiritual needs of our time; and as I waited for my friend to do her business, I read the Preface, Authors’ Note, and Chapter One: The Seeker, and I was hooked; so I bought it.

          I’ve only got two more chapters to go, and I’m very grateful for the opportunity to get a look into the spiritually disciplined life of a modern monastic Catholic order because it gave me an insight into Catholicism that I needed to round off my understanding of my old Roman Catholic faith, which for reasons much too deep to explain here, was terribly skewed by my New Age spirituality—but which my spiritual healing sessions with you set straight, and for which I am ever so grateful!

          If I may Padre, let me wax philosophical a moment about my relationship with my old Roman Catholic faith and my relationship with you, which came as a COMPLETE SURPRISE to me. But strangely enough, you did tell me in my last spiritual healing session that you and I had planned on the Other Side before we came into the world to work together to help raise the spiritual consciousness of the world, but I had a long journey to make before I was ready to meet you through my spiritual sensitive last year! My God, what a journey it was just to get to the point where we could work together on my book Healing with Padre Pio!

          The point I want to make is that my relationship with my Roman Catholic faith grew out of a misunderstanding of the spirituality of this great religion founded upon the teachings of Jesus Christ, and I had to go through hell to find my way out of the labyrinthine nonsense of the false premises of my Roman Catholic faith (like eternal damnation in hell, to name the most psychically damaging false premise)—and I came out bitter and angry at Christianity. So bitter and angry that I needed the healing grace of a Roman Catholic Saint who had suffered the holy wounds of Jesus for fifty years to heal my wounded Christian soul! And I thank you for that, Padre.

          As I said in my novel Healing with Padre Pio, we began with the premise of healing my wounded Christian soul, but we ended up healing the wounded soul of Christianity, and finally the wounded soul of the world with the healing grace of your consciousness of “all-knowing and all seeing.” I simple proved to be the medium for your healing grace, and I feel privileged to have been, and continue to be of service to your mission of serving life from the Other Side.

          Padre, you did say in one of the books that I read on your life that you would do more for humanity from the Other Side (actually, you used the word heaven) than you could do while you were in your suffering body, and given the testimonials that I read of all the miracles that people from all over the world have attributed to you, it seems that you were right—not to mention what you are doing with me! But just what are you doing with me? Let’s look at this for a moment…

          I believe you are allowing me to offer the world the very UNIQUE PERSPECTIVE of a Roman Catholic Saint who has transcended the inflexible doctrine of Roman Catholicism and realized spiritual ascendancy into the Soul Consciousness of all knowing and all seeing, thereby allowing the world to see that all spiritual paths come from what you have symbolically revealed to me as the River of God that flows into different streams and which we impede by placing our “rocks” of misunderstanding into our individual stream, and it’s your duty in your service to God to help us become aware of our spiritual impasses so we can continue on our journey home to God; but, of course, you know very well how Roman Catholics are going to respond to this.

This is going to be controversial, but as you said in one of my sessions when I brought this up, “controversy is good because it causes dialogue”—and the world is in desperate need of a new dialogue on Christianity, which Bishop John Shelby Spong is trying to initiate with books like Why Christianity Must Change or Die, and Jesus for the Non-Religious. I know my book Healing with Padre Pio is a novel, but I had to couch my spiritual healing sessions with you into a story of fiction, because that’s the only way I could have the freedom to explore our process together.

Controversial or not then, I’m writing you these letters for personal reasons, and what happens thereafter will be up to Providence. I’ve since come to see that my life is choreographed from above, and all I can do is play my little part and hope for the best; so whether people like this privileged glimpse into your life as an Ascended Spiritual Master or not, it’s not really for me to say. All I can do is work out the thoughts and ideas that I am given to express creatively through my writing, and I know that this epistolary project is going to prove very, very satisfying.

Before I close this letter, I’m going to make a personal request. I know from my reading that we have to be specific in our requests from Holy Spirit, and I’m going to be specific in my invocation to you (being an Ascended Master, I know that you are one with Spirit): please let my published books begin to bear financial fruit soon, because it’s causing Penny and myself a great deal of anxiety waiting for all the good karma that we have put into getting my books written and published to reap some financial benefits—my latest book being Keeper of the Flame, which came out last month, and My Unborn Child which came out last summer. 

I know that you told me in one of my spiritual healing sessions that it would take three years for the ripple effect of my writing to show remunerative return, but it would be so nice to see some definite signs soon because all of this waiting is hard on our nerves.

Last night we picked up a coffee at Tim Hortons and went for a long drive to talk things out (we do this often just to air our head), and we discussed the possibility of having to move back up north into our triplex (we have two units rented, which go towards the mortgage on the house; we used to live on the top unit) and sell our house down here in Georgian Bay to finance our retirement; but as realistic as I am and would concede to the idea, I don’t want to, and neither does Penny. So Padre, if you would, please intercede for us, because I honestly don’t know what else we can do to make it happen.

I pour my heart and soul into my writing, and Penny pours her heart and soul into editing, formatting, and getting my books out to our publisher, and then doing book trailers and promoting and marketing them wherever she can on the Internet—after her work day and on weekends!

Penny’s invaluable to my writing, and I don’t know what I would do without her; but we are getting on in years, and we are getting concerned. I only wish I did not have to have a bypass operation three years ago. It put a serious damper on our finances, and we’re hoping that one of my books connects before our savings run out; so, again, please see what you can do to remove those obstacles that are keeping my books from connecting with the readers that I know are out there waiting to read them.

I have a lot of trust in you Padre. Given what I experienced with my spiritual healing sessions, I believe in you; but Penny hasn’t quite rapped her head around my relationship with you yet, and I have to be patient. She is my heart and soul, and my love for her only grows deeper with each new day, and the last thing I want is to burden her with the anxiety of financial struggle in our old age. Let it happen Padre, before it’s too late.

I remain,

Your faithful companion,

Orest

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WATCH FOR NEXT WEEK'S LETTER: No. 4:  The Whole World's Asleep