The Holy Nights at Anthroposophy NYC

December 26, 2022 – January 6, 2023: All online and some onsite
All programs begin at 7 pm, online and some onsite.
Click here for more Zoom information about this series.

“What is quicker than light? Conversation!” ~ Goethe

Following Christmas, we have the span of short days and long nights leading to Three Kings/Epiphany. While the outer light is dimmest, it is social light and warmth that bears us through the winter cold. Conversation, heartfelt and alive in thought, can be the true substance of community. We invite you to this Holy Nights series of brief introductions followed by conversation. All (except for January 6^th) will be Zoomed, some both live at Anthroposophy NYC and online.

December 26: The Writer’s Life (Zoom only)
Carolyn Jourdan, anthroposophist, hillbilly, engineering-/law-degreed best-selling author and victorious survivor of the labyrinths of Washington DC, publishing and life’s curve- and knuckle-balls, talks about her journey—and the Sacred Path of Listening.

December 27: Rudolf Steiner’s Calendar of the Soul (onsite at Anthroposophy NYC and Zoomed) with Don Bartlett, anthroposophist and retired psychotherapist. The Calendar of the Soul verses, among Steiner’s precious gifts, follow the seasons, equinoxes and solstices, interweaving feeling, memory, will, cosmic thinking, and the Cosmic Word. Don will present a brief overview of the Calendar of the Soul verses, and how they directly relate to our spiritual evolution.

December 28: Reflections on Roots by a Herbalist Joanna Gabler
Joanna collects roots of plants and use them as medicine and, like all of you, she eat root vegetables. “When Walter asked me to talk about roots, he thought that my herbal studies prepared me well to talk about what is happening among tree and plant roots in winter. In fact, I don’t know much about that. However, his prompting inspired me to start thinking about the word ‘roots’ and the many parallels between a human being and a tree. I will share my musings and invite you to a further conversation about our roots and how consciousness of them affects us.”
 
December 29: The Birth of the Sun Spirit as the Spirit of the Earth by Joanna Bergmann
Joanna will introduce the 3rd lecture in the series by Steiner entitled “The Festivals and their Meaning: Christmas, The Birth of the Sun Spirit as the Spirit of the Earth. The Thirteen Holy Nights,” given on the 26th of December, 1911, in Hanover, Germany. She will show how Steiner spoke about the 6th of January as significant, not just as Three Kings’ Day or Epiphany (from the Greek for “manifestation”), but rather hidden since 354 AD as “the descent of the Christ Being into the body of Jesus of Nazareth.”

December 30: Parable of the Vineyard Workers and Accepting the Divine Will by Paul Lynch
Paul will discuss this Parable of the Vineyard Workers (Matthew 20:1-16). He chose it because it relates to the difficulty in accepting the Divine Will.  Also, he will briefly discuss a few items about the Holy Nights from Adrian Anderson’s “Living a Spiritual Year.”

December 31: Understanding the Nature of a True “Pause” by Michael Vode
Michael, an anthroposophist, retired English teacher, poet, and longtime member of the School of Spiritual Science and the Christian Community, will discuss the nature of a true pause, and the pressing need in our time for its practice and emergence in an individual’s everyday life. He will include a reading from the first pages of Guenther Dellbruegger’s book Active Pause: a Plea for a New Conception of Time.

January 1: Narrative for Humanity (Reclaiming the Story of Who We Are) by Walter Alexander
Walter will explore how the poet Muriel Rukeyser’s “the world is not made of particles, it’s made of stories” can and must be seen–not as lovely, interesting sentiment–but as a fact. The general non-recognition of this fact as bedrock reality comes at great cost. The telling of this story, for those who understand it (anthroposophists, for example), carries an urgency today, may even be an essential task.

January 2: All the Living and “The Dead” by Fred Dennehy
Retired attorney, active actor and playwright, co-Class reader of the School of Spiritual Science, Fred Dennehy, will read from James Joyce’s “The Dead.”
Fred writes: “In order for us to fulfill our mission on earth, the feeling of community, unity even, with all things living and dead has to become a concrete experience. A particularly powerful cognitive feeling of that experience is given in “The Dead,” the final story in James Joyce’s collection The Dubliners.“

January 3: Janus 2022 into 2023–What Do We Mean by HOME? by Joyce Reilly
Joyce has many decades of experience in coaching and counseling individuals and groups. She will share some of her experiences in resettlement of refugees from Darfur (2010-2013) and what “the guys” are doing today. We will explore the concept of “home” and how we build shelter and support for ourselves and each other. Plan to share your most moving experience of 2022 or the recent past and begin to imagine what opportunities 2023 will offer.

January 4: Presentation by Gritli Kux Rabin, Artist
This series of apparently abstract pieces will illustrate my creative process, one that evolves after inspiration, practice, play, and falling in love. “Where does my art come from? I hope that after this presentation you will enlighten me.”
 
January 5: The Pouring Vessel of Love by Ellen Gayda
Ellen Gayda is an intuitive healer, bodyworker and Gestalt therapist who facilitates women’s wisdom circles, and has lectured extensively over forty years on health and healing as a creative process. 
During The Holy Nights revealed, the pouring of the Beloved Light that seeds the world with Love is born. Hallelujah! Touching upon her experiences and perspective of the soul’s body as an intimate vessel of communication, we will reflect and share about our personal soul journey toward embodiment and on our relationship to the Sacred Feminine Sophia.
 
January 6: Three Kings/Epiphany Celebration at Anthroposophy NYC
End of Holy Nights celebration and gathering. Rita Constanzi will present a Three Kings Offering with song and verse by David Spangler. She will lead us in singing carols, as well.

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Anthroposophy NYC is inviting you to scheduled Zoom meetings for Holy Nights 2022-23 from Dec 26, 2022, through Jan 5, 2023. Click here for more Zoom information about this series.