July 13, 2018
Dear Friends,
Mary Magdalene was a refugee, fleeing violence in the same way refugees all over the world are fleeing violence and the corrupt systems that perpetrate violence. Mary Magdalene was a refugee like current refugees that come seeking safety after witnessing torture and murder of their families and loved ones. Mary Magdalene witnessed Jesus being tortured and murdered but that is not the end of her story. She became a religious teacher, a wounded healer and a tower of strength for her community bringing the teachings of Jesus to France. She is the divine wisdom or the divine feminine we need now more than ever before. We call upon her to help us reconnect us to God, to make of our hearts, one heart. The Latina women of faith seeking strength to know where to turn to save their children, themselves and their loved ones, need the spirit of Mary Magdalene today. She is our teacher for she is someone who has experienced this kind of crisis and she was the disciple who really comprehended and conveyed Jesus message. She calls to us now to have hope in love.
The global refugee crisis has been caused by the economic corporate imperial powers who have also created climate change and are destroying human life, as well as non-human life to say nothing of our common home Mother Earth. Our hope is to invite others to see that for everyone's survival we must give up corrupt systems of destruction and create new ways to live in justice and peace together. The human refugee crisis has been going on for many years and currently it has catapulted itself into the consciousness of many more people who have become aware of the issues right here in our community of San Diego. Church for Our Common Home has made a commitment to bear witness to this local and global horror by moving our weekly prayer services to the sidewalk in front of the Otay Mesa Detention Center. We pray for the separated families, the babies, the children, their mother's, often rape victims, their father's often gang violence victims, the devastated countrysides that have been raped by corporate greed leaving poverty and ecologic devastation in its wake. We also pray for the care workers including immigration lawyers, social justice workers, faith leaders, journalists, etc all trying to respond to this evil. We also pray as Jesus taught us, for our enemies who have created, sustain and profit from the systems of evil that have created this refugee and planetary nightmare. To separate mothers from their babies is the height of inhumanity. Our country has lost its way! It is time to look at our prison systems overall as a symptom of our problem for there are more than 2.7 million children in the U.S. that have an incarcerated parent.
The corrupt governments and drug lords that refugees are fleeing from in Central America were trained and financially underwritten by the US government. The enemy is within our own borders and within our own value systems that are complicit with these systems of injustice that cause massive suffering and planetary destruction. The local refugee humanitarian crisis here at the border in San Diego is interrelated with all the other current planetary crisis. Jesus did not teach about how to change the Roman Empire but rather how to live in loving community with others despite the violence and injustice of the Roman Empire. Church for Our Common Home is working to create a loving presence and community amidst suffering. We are called to make Christianity relevant and spirit filled again. This is happening through the spirit of Mary Magdalene and the divine feminine that has too often been left out of mainline Christianity. We are called by God to create radical new kinds of Christian communities of love and healing within the catastrophic evils of our time, not leaving women like Mary Magdalene out, but by celebrating women in religious leadership, women as teachers, healers and as visionary dreamers and space conquerors of imaginal realms.
Mary Magdalene has much to teach us at this historic time and we will reflect on her story and teachings at our three remaining worship services at the Otay Mesa Detention Center, Sunday's at 5 pm this July. Out of the literal and symbolic desert of Egypt her story has come to us through newly found scriptures, including Gnostic gospels like the Gospel of Mary Magdalene. Many of us feel her spirit as we work to explore the divine feminine moving beyond the Divine Mother to a woman who was a partner with Jesus. Together they created religious community and a faith story. Mary Magdalene was the most advanced spiritual student of Jesus who embodies the message of love and is his partner in the resurrection. He was NOT alone when he died or even after death. He was with Mary Magdalene and their love for one another is still with us today.
July 15 Sermon "Mary Magdalene as Refugee and Religious Leader"
July 22 Sermon "Mary Magdalene as Refugee, Anointer and Healer"
July 29 Sermon " Mary Magdalene as Refugee and the Imaginal Realm"
Her teachings she either learned from Jesus or a more believable story to me is that she co-created these teachings with him. Teachings of love are about relationships and the relationship between Jesus and Mary Magdalene has been too hot to handle historically but it is being told with new scholarship today. Christianity is at its core is a religion that teaches that love is more powerful than torture and death. We offer this hope and healing message to those people in the Otay Mesa Detention Center and all those suffering from injustice.
According to legend that many reputable scholars now believe, Mary Magdalene escaped after Jesus was tortured and murdered. The story of Mother Mary and Joseph escaping to Egypt with baby Jesus is really the story about Mary Magdalene being taken to Egypt to escape, that was disguised for her safety. Christianity has never been more relevant as we explore new spiritual depths Mary Magdalene offers.
Mary Magdalene "weaves into one cloth those strands that have traditionally been kept so stringently separated: conscious love, healing, kenotic surrender, the feminine, singleness, transformation. To touch any part of this hologram is to invoke the rest. " Cynthia Bourgeult,
The Meaning of Mary Magdalene
. Come join us as we enter the hologram that is the spirit of Mary Magdalene.
As we,"reclaim anointing in its original context making it the sacramental centerpiece of a whole new vision of Christianity based on spiritual transformation and the alchemy of love." We recognize that those of us who have experienced trauma are called to heal ourselves in order to dedicate our lives to working for justice and healing for others.
Mary Magdalene
Anointing Worship Sunday July 15, 22, and 29
5 pm
Church for Our Common Home
at the
Otay Mesa Detention Center
7488 Calzada De La Fuente, San Diego, CA 92154, on the side walk.
Rev. Bonnie Tarwater, Affiliate Community Minister First Unitarian Universalist Church of SD
All are welcome at God’s table. Finger food pot luck after the service.
We will gather on the sidewalk, so please bring folding chairs.
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Also on live stream on
Church for Our Common Home Facebook page.
More info call (858) 248-5123
www.churchforourcommonhome.com
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