The Foundation Stone and Its Celestial Rhythms

WITH MARY STEWART ADAMS AND EURYTHMY SPRING VALLEY ENSEMBLE, SPONSORED BY THE THREEFOLD BRANCH

Saturday, August 26, 2023
Threefold Auditorium, Chestnut Ridge, NY
1:00-5:00 pm
With Foundation Stone in Eurythmy
7:30-9:00 pm

“Surrendering himself to the supreme direction of the cosmos that is all around him, man can carry out in living consciousness the act of transubstantiation in the great temple of the Cosmos–standing within it as one who is celebrating a sacrifice in a purely spiritual way…The world becomes Temple, the House of God.”

These words were spoken, by Rudolf Steiner in the First Goetheanum on New Year’s Eve, 1922, as he pointed the way to “the spiritual Communion of mankind.”

Throughout our lives the Cosmos is in movement, with planets coming into remarkable alignments as they wander through the regions of the zodiac. For most of us, these “conversations” go unnoticed, but Rudolf Steiner encouraged us ever more to bring them into our consciousness. This year, on August 26th, we have a remarkable opportunity to do this.

On Christmas Day, 1923, the south moon node—that place in the zodiac where the moon rises above the ecliptic each month—stood in the constellation of Aquarius. As we know, this nodal point takes 18.7 years to make one full turn around the ecliptic.

This year, on the 26th of August, Saturn will come to this same place in Aquarius—right where the south moon node stood during the Christmas Conference—and, as it does so, the Sun will stand opposite, in Leo, at the position of the Moon’s north node. We on the earth will stand directly between these two celestial bodies. The axis that is thus formed, from Saturn through the earth to the Sun, will pass through the very place that the Moon’s Nodes were during the Christmas Conference—the first time this has occurred in the past century. It is quite a picture!

Working with such a moment can help us meet the challenge Rudolf Steiner gave to us on that fateful New Year’s Eve: to lift ourselves from mere abstract knowledge of the world to a relationship which engages our will and feeling. “Man’s whole relationship to the world must be recognized to be one of cosmic ritual.”

Mary Stewart Adams will work with us to come to a deeper appreciation not only of this cosmic event, but also of the way it can bring us more deeply into the inner reality of the Foundation Stone verse. We will then move into an experience of eurythmy followed by a conversation on the Foundation Stone Meditation in relation to the theme. And this will prepare us for an evening with two presentations of the Foundation Stone in eurythmy.

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1:00-1:15 pm Welcome and Introduction to the Day
1:15-2:30 pm A talk by Mary Stewart Adams
2:30-3:30 pm Eurythmy
3:30-3:45 pm Break
3:45-5:00 pm Conversation groups on the Foundation Stone
5:00-7:30 pm Supper Break (please note that the Threefold Café will not be open that day)
7:30 pm The Foundation in Stone in Eurythmy, with short presentations on the theme,
followed again by the Foundation Stone in Eurythmy (free will donation)

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Free Will Donation for the Afternoon (suggested donation $25-$50)
Pre-Registration Appreciated But Not Required
Inquiries and Pre-Registration: Karl Fredrickson, kfredson@gmail.com