The Conditions...

Last month a friend begged me to publish a particular prayer in our magazine The Tree of Life (which you can see online at www.treeoflifemagazine.com). It was a prayer to Jesus for healing [insert name here] but it would only work if the prayer was published and passed on.

In the end I published it in my blog - you can see it in the next blog down - because she was so upset and needed the favour so much. Not because I thought that fulfilling the condition made any difference to the prayer.

And of course there have been this month’s usual rash of conditional emails – you’ll have good luck if you send this on; please forward this because AOL/Microsoft etc will pay money if it goes to a million people…or money will be raised for a little girl who’s been dying of cancer for more than eight years now…

I got a round-robin email sending all this up today – with the conclusion reading:

“If you don't send this e-mail to at least 144,000 people in the next 70 minutes, a large dove with diarrhoea will land on your head at 5:00 PM this afternoon and the fleas from 12 camels will infest your back, causing you to grow a hairy hump. I know this will occur because it actually happened to a friend of my next door neighbour’s ex-mother-in-law's second husband's cousin's beautician...” which at least gave me a laugh!

So why do so many of us still pass these conditional (even threatening) emails on? They are, essentially, chain letters and we fear that if we don’t do what we are told, we will be in trouble.

Well hey there, that’s a perfect reflection of our belief about the Source – or, to put it more accurately, God. So many of us use ‘Source,’ ‘Higher Self’ etc instead of God purely because we have the idea of the vengeful, angry old man in the sky. But there’s no use just changing the name without the belief.

Those old religious beliefs about unworthiness, having to suffer to get what we want and it not being spiritual to be rich are still out there. I asked a woman at one of my talks the other day whether she believed that women should cover their hair at all times; whether they should be subject to their husbands and whether they should not speak in public. She said “Of course not”. And yet she was totally wedded to another of St Paul’s phrases (misquoted) “Money is the root of all evil” and felt she couldn’t possibly ask for any.

But if you take one teaching, you really must take them all! And if one is doubtful, you must check them all out!

Now, to be fair, St Paul’s teaching about women was probably only sensible and practical at a time when the self-castrated male priests of Cybele wore loose long hair, women’s clothing and prophesied in the streets about a resurrected son of a virgin. Those priests were likely to be murdered in the streets as an abomination to right-thinking Romans. And any Christian woman doing the same would probably be mistaken for a priest of Cybele and meet the same fate. And no other religion allowed women to prophesy in the streets so for a Christian woman to do it would also have been as extraordinary as wearing your knickers on your head.

AND St Paul’s actual teaching about money is this:

“Having food and raiment let us be therewith content. But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.”

Somewhat more kindly translated from the Greek it means:

“Having sustenance (food, all bills paid, holidays four times a year in Jerusalem and enough to cover tax and council tax) and covering (a house of our own without mortgage, suitable clothing for all events, furniture and clothing), let us be therewith content.
"But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.
For the avarice is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.”

Not many of us would be avaricious if we had everything we needed provided. And it is true that seeking money for money’s sake (addictive gambling etc.) can hurt us. So St Paul wasn’t so far off the mark.

And yet, that one phrase ‘money is the root of all evil’ has been the greatest inhibitor of wealth in so many spiritual people for centuries. It’s even assumed to be taught by Jesus – or be direct from the mouth of God.

It’s just one bloke saying what he thinks with his own loading. Nothing more. It’s not God telling you that it’s wrong to be prosperous – even wealthy.

Jesus’ own teachings about money we can deal with another time – but basically they are the same, that you can have whatever you want but don’t plan to hold onto it so that it holds you back in your life.

So, back to conditions. God/Source is NOT conditional. When it comes to prosperity, It doesn’t give a stuff whether you are good or bad. If you are prosperous it is because you have prosperity consciousness which the Universe recognizes and to which it responds. And that you are willing and able to receive the great abundance which pours down on us all 24/7.

So this month’s exercise is to realize that the Source is neutral; that happiness and prosperity are in your choice, not doled out to the worthy by a judgmental God who loads you down with conditions. It is YOUR conditional thinking that causes the problem. These emails are just demonstrating it back to you if you even consider passing them on.

So, stop sending on conditional emails. It’s quite easy to cut the threat off at the end if they are otherwise lovely. Then, if you are not putting conditions on others, then the Universe will stop putting conditions on you….

And try this very simple affirmation: “Thank you for my wonderful prosperity consciousness.” Believe me, it works.