Goddess Shines: Madonna

December Goddess: The Madonna/Mother Mary
December 27th, Friday 6:30pm $10
Church of Spiritual Light 1939 Park Meadows Dr. #1, Fort Myers, FL 33907

Join us as we celebrate the holi-day season and the winter solstice with the honoring of The Madonna.

The process of purification is seldom easy, but this is the great work required in all mystery schools, which Mary had long since accomplished beyond that attained by the many. For she had come as all persons do, through many lifetimes of sorrow, hardship, work, play and experience, but had been able to arrive at a greater place within her true Self. That is, she had received God-Realization.

Mary, or Mare, is interpreted by the Spanish as "The Star of the Sea." Esoterically, the sea is the desire nature, and the star is the spirit which rises above the lower nature, even as Grecian mythology portrays Venus, the goddess of love, rising star- crowned from the sea, being symbolical of the separation of love from passion.

Many interpretations have been given the name Mary, so common to women in the gospels, never used before in the Scriptures unless it is a diminutive of the Hebrew Miryam, the sister of Moses. The meaning of Mary is sometimes given as "bitter," sometimes "exalted of the Lord," but the most simply correct is said to be "My Lady." Indeed, that sounds most like her -- Madonna, as one who was high-born and blessed.

The Firstborn of God should open the womb from within outward, having been conceived on the inner realm. It could not receive seed from the outside to be built upon and then emerge again having an earth foundation. The seed was received and developed inside to show that the Christ can only be born within us, and cannot enter from without to be born.

God took a rib from Adam's side to make woman, who became imperfect; then He brought forth from the perfected woman's womb a perfect man. Having first created man alone, at Creation's dawn, God now worked with woman alone, with Mary, (though He eventually gave to each a partner). From the substance of her body was fashioned the mold which would receive the Spirit of the Son.


Mother Mary - Madonna
No other woman in the world reveals the truth as deeply and dramatically as the Virgin Mary for the template of how to be in the world, but not of it. She is so profoundly inextricably tied to the raising of the Messiah that it is all but impossible to think of one without the other. This is by design.

Madonna says...
I am the embodiment of the purest essence of the divine mother that resides within each of you. Within your heart and soul there is a woman, a mother, a perfect mother who has never left you and can never leave you. You have only to call for her and to receive her blessings, her love and her nurturing.

Inside of each of you is the babe, the orphaned child, born apparently and physically fatherless. And in order for you to find your father, you must first allow your mother's embrace to comfort and protect you. She loves you so much. I, says the Madonna, am the eternal emblem for the almighty power of mother and child. My child, my fatherless child, raised the Messiah within and reached the crowning achievement of ascended consciousness and re-united with his heavenly father.

This is your template. This is your design. You and he are one and the same. He showed the way, now you must follow. You must not be afraid, for I am here. Please accept my loving embrace. Do not allow the hurt you have experienced at the hands of impure hearts, including your own, to affect your ability to connect with me. I am your salvation. I am the one who can lead you to the Messiah, to the one within who is your savior.

The savior is you. He sits in the middle of your body, in your solar plexis at the seat of your soul and he guides you endlessly with radiant light, raw instinct, ancient memories and divine purpose. The christ consciousness must be allowed to infiltrate your entire body. You must allow it to move from your head, down into your heart.This is what will bring you to the place of divinely guided action. This is what will bring you to your absolute genius and help you deliver your gift to the world.

I am your blessed mother. I purified and purified my being to bring the Savior into the physical. My vessel is not unclean, my energy is clear, my conscience is intact. I do not wallow in denial. My body is a powerful channel for divine love. My body is your body.

We are all one. All of us are within you, moving through you, moving you. We are the unseen forces at work bringing you to your ultimate purpose, your ultimate salvation.

Your mother loves you. You father is waiting for you to recognize him. He sits within you, brilliant and blazing. She cups Her hands and shields you from his fiery countenance, so that one day, when you are ready, you will be strong enough to turn you gaze on the brilliance of the unknowable, unfathomable magnificence of all that you are. The Trinity is within thee.

Shine my star, shine!

Madonna Affirmations

I am the mother and the mother is in me.
Women are kind. I am kind.
I see the divine mother and call to her to be with me.
I allow myself to experience the pleasure of beauty and truth.
I activate the Savior within.
I carry the imprint of the Messiah within my blood, bones and breath.
The mother and the father and I are one.
I am that I am.
All that I am, you are.
I am a healer of the earth.
I nurture and care for my body, mind and soul.
I allow my heart to open and expand into divine love.
I receive agape now.
I am filled with the love and light of our creator.
I am my brother's keeper.
I am the greatest realization of my Father.
I work for the greater good of all humanity.

Christmas Eve Silent Night Ceremony

Silent Night, Holy Night Christmas Eve Ceremony, Tuesday, December 24th 7pm at Church of Spiritual Light 1939 Park Meadows Dr. #1, Fort Myers, FL 33907

Mystic Midnight Sun is a time for the potential of Great and Silent Spiritual Awakening. Through the powers of the intensified celestial light the dense debris of our karmic release, confusion, distortion, trauma, pain and suffering have the potential to be transmuted into spiritual gold. At this point the astral plane and the angelic hierarchy begin to open the floodgates to infuse the earth with the angelic power. This flood of energy reaches its highest point on midnight of Christmas Eve.

Our ceremony which begins at 7pm will be a silent vigil of candlelight and sacred communion with the gathering angelic forces. We will culminate at midnight, as those who are so inclined will car pool to attend the Midnight Mass at 11:30 PM at St. Luke's Episcopal Church. There is the Music of Christmas followed by Blessing of the Creche & Solemn Midnight Mass.

Winter Solstice Holiday Ceremony

You are cordially invited to the Winter Solstice Holiday Ceremony on Saturday, December 21st at 6:30pm at Church of Spiritual Light.

This festivity brings a time to celebrate the season and really take in the heavenly energies that are closest to the earth. In honor of this we will be paying homage to the beauty of the inner masculine and feminine forces of light within each of us with a dance. To honor this union, Deb and David Martin will be dancing the Tango in our ceremony. Possibly one of the most romantic and beautiful dances of all time. The ceremony will also include some very enlightening information about your own astrological sign as it pertains to the energy of the season, as well as, rituals to help you gather your energy and focus for the coming year. Refreshment will be served.

The ceremony will be hosted by Rev. Renee Bledsoe, Rev. Miriam Lynne Pietrzyk and Melissa Leblanc.
Church of Spirituial Light, 1939 Park Meadows Dr. #1, Ft. Myers, FL 33907. The donation is $20.

Devotion: Rebirth of Divinity

“In your light I learn how to love. In your beauty, how to make poems. You dance inside my chest where no-one sees you, but sometimes I do, and that sight becomes this art." - Rumi

What is devotion? And how is devotion different from attachment, obsession or addictions?

The dictionary definition of devotion is depicted as love, loyalty, or enthusiasm for a person, activity, or cause. Fair enough.. but this definition leaves something out that is all important to this understanding and has everything to do with qualifying this process. For it is not the love, the loyalty or the enthusiasm that creates devotion... it is the why behind those things that tell the tale.

Devotion also has an inherent sidenote of exclusivity. We've often heard the phrase, "you cannot serve two masters". And while this is certainly true, when there is devotion, it's not that there is no other. Quite to the contrary, for in that devotion lives the All... and the passageway to the door of everything... a way in the depths of understanding required to unlock our heart of hearts. True devotion is complete in and of itself, and takes not away from anything else, nor adds to it. It is timeless, and eternal.

Before devotion, we are as scattered seeds... floating, falling, landing... here, there and anywhere... everywhere... looking for love in all the wrong places. Be-longing our existence. This is by design. For devotion is an electro-magnetic force that calls us into a higher order of being and helps us to find our place in the galaxy. The faint memory of this cohesion lingers, haunts and propels us forward, seeking, reaching and expanding.

The shadow side of devotion is addiction, obsession, codependency and attachment. These are the seeds of devotion, and the responses of the mind or body thinking and feeling its way to love, inching along in lack and control in search of a connection that has been veiled, but far from forgotten.

Devotion does not offer a solution, it is the blackhole that consumes us and when it comes it brings an opportunity to give unconditional love. And in the absolute abundance of that giving, all is received.

Even in the shadow of addiction and attachment this process gives back all, as it takes everything. Yet, devotion lacks the hallmark of addiction, namely a price that can never be paid in full... in a deal with the devil. For it is a deal with an angel, the angel that overlights life and the eternal will to good, and it never takes the light from our eyes or our soul.

Devotion gives life, like breathing.Within the  cocoon of devotion there is an in breath and an out breath. Unlike our addiction to love, devotion is alive, filled with the energy that sustains life.. and the full undivided attention of the divine presence within. It takes nothing real, and gives everything essence. It takes everything false, and breathes flesh to its bones.

The price of devotion is inherent in the devotion itself, and requires no external motivation, as it appears only through the free will of our attention, appreciation and awareness, which becomes the devotion itself. Devotion cannot be attended fully without inner vision and spiritual sight. For in devotion we are called and carried into the sea of our devotion to depths and heights not able to be accessed in physical realms alone, nor in spiritual realms alone. Devotion will not suffer ignorance on either side.

Devotion is at once simple and complex in its subtleties. The beauty we receive compares in no way to what is merely seen. True devotion takes us beyond good and bad, beyond our preferences. It takes us to a new land of day, even in the darkest night of our soul. Devotion is the synergy, the third thing that arises from true love. Having a life of its own, it calls us forward into a world that was barely accessible to us. With devotion, the deepest, highest, quietest and largest levels of love are revealed.

Devotion is the opposite of attraction, addiction and attachment. It is a love so complete that we die the ego death every day willingly, just to stay attuned. For devotion opens our palms and lets fall out of our hands the need or desire to control. The wait for what comes next is breathless, inspiring, inspired and pregnant with unimaginable possibility. In devotion, the last thing you would ever want to do is change a hair on the head of the beloved... whomever or whatever or however that applies.

Devotion is love in action... wringing a response from the depths of our being. To not respond, even in inward movement and leaping heart, or silent reprieve is not an option. Not because it demands it, but because it is it. It simply is... and has no meaning, beyond a deeper understanding that is ineffable, often wordless, nameless and still.

Devotion makes us content to sit, stand, move, run, jump, or kneel. It makes our whole life a prayer, and in that sacrament all action is sacred. And when there is someone or something eternal that draws us into this space, then we will know God. When we can take that devotion all the way, go all the way down into it, it will always bring us home to ourselves.

When we serve in the light of devotion we are not excluding anything else... for in that devotion all is served, all is included. It brings us to the wholeness of our freedom to choose. And in the absence of self and devotion to this external God, if we remain humble teachable, receptive and giving to the All... there is no way that we will not find ourselves standing at the temple door of our soul.. to worship the divine within each of us...and all around.

And when we reach the shores of our own soul... all the souls are there... we can hear them... see them... sense them... listening... exquisite... now the single point of God is revealed in this moment of eternity that is ever expanding in our mind, in our heart... and if we can allow... our body... and every single thing that we see, touch, taste, hear and smell... every sensory.. both physical and meta translates the bliss of our devotion.

This is how Divine identity... divinity is brought forth and birthed... through our devotion. The act of true devotion  is the operation that leads us to the light of our own soul. Leading us to the treasure of our own soul... and to the oversoul of this entire creation. The way out is through, and once we make it through the path of true love and devotion we find that there is no place we'd rather be, for we have found our home.

How do you find your devotion?...Beyond good and bad, beyond your preferences, your likes and dislikes.... what else is there?

"If you bring forth what is within you What you bring forth will save you If you do not bring forth what is within you, What you do not bring forth will destroy you". - Jesus (The Gospel of Thomas)

be; Rev. Renee Bledsoe

Divine Union and the Devotion of Her

Rumi on Devotion
“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.”

 “Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing  and rightdoing there is a field. I'll meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass the world is too full to talk about.”

“The minute I heard my first love story, I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don't finally meet somewhere. They're in each other all along.”

“What you seek is seeking you.”

“Words are a pretext. It is the inner bond that draws one person to another, not words.”

“A thousand half-loves must be forsaken to take one whole heart home.”

“People want you to be happy. Don't keep serving them your pain! If you could untie your wings and free your soul of jealousy, you and everyone around you would fly up like doves.”

“I have lived on the lip of insanity, wanting to know reasons, knocking on a door. It opens. I've been knocking from the inside.”

“Take someone who doesn't keep score, who's not looking to be richer, or afraid of losing, who has not the slightest interest even in his own personality: he's free.”

“Knock, And He'll open the door Vanish, And He'll make you shine like the sun Fall, And He'll raise you to the heavens Become nothing, And He'll turn you into everything.”


1st Corinthians
If I speak in the tongues[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast,[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part,10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. 12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

DECEMBER 2013: Divine Light

“Happiness can be found even in the darkest of times, when one only remembers to turn on the light.” - Albus Dumbledore

In theology, divine light (also called divine radiance or divine refulgence) is an aspect of divine presence, specifically an unknown and mysterious ability of God, angels, or human beings to express themselves communicatively through spiritual means, rather than through physical capacities. Spiritual light or divine light is often used as a metaphor for the Truth, as in seeing the light. However, spiritual light is a very real phenomenon that has a profound effect upon the earth and her inhabitants on many levels of being.

“Whoever lives the truth comes into the light.” (John 3:21)

Bringing in more divine light is accomplished slowly and over time, as we remove layers of denial and awaken to ever deepening understanding of the true nature of our being. Truth is revealed, this allows enlightenment to occur.. meaning darkness and confusion are brought to order. This order, at first can feel a little austere, and a kind of emptiness can occur, especially if the segueway into our purpose is not quite in step with the dance of our new beginnings. Yet, this stage of enlightenment is not to be feared. There is a definitive point in time where we are claiming the truth of our free will and going to places of greater responsibility with our free will.

At first when the full weight of that is felt, acknowledged and understood, it can press upon us and feel quite overwhelming. This is why the process of enlightenment, while in it's initial stages often entails a great deal of clearing and letting go of belief systems that do not serve free will, is ultimately leading us to the realization of our freedom to create our life, to live out our destiny in the highest, most ingenious ways we can imagine. Navigating in the emptiness of our own divine identity as it is coming to light is a time when our true selves are literally coming alive or coming online. It truly is an awakening and an unfolding of the great mystery within.

“We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.” ― Plato

As we begin the process of unfolding, much like a flower that opens its petals to the sun, we continue to bring in more and more light. It becomes important for us to consciously work with light. We do this by continuing practices which help us to raise and maintain higher levels of awareness and mindfulness. some of that freedom we have earned includes the propensity to tell the truth.... regularly and even at cost to what was before. When this is faithfully done, we start to see the perfection of this existence in greater detail. This brings us into a deep appreciation for our life and for all life. This appreciation and gratitude becomes a way of being, and not just a list that we rustle up when we need a reminder to pull us out of the doldrums.

Often we will hear teachers remind us of the power of our shadow and going into our own darkness. While these teachings are helpful for sure, ultimately if you look at darkness or chaos as a part of creation, or the void of creation to be more specific, then you will understand that journeying through a measure of darkness is a valid part of the process of creating our lives, and our divine identity. But just as the physical birth process and our time in the womb and passage through the birth canal is not the whole of our life experience, but in reality only the beginning, for our divinity is born through the passage through the valley of the shadow of darkness into the light in much the same way. Notice that it says the shadow of darkness. This could be interpreted as saying that when we are in the void or the unknown aspects of creation that if we are suffering, in pain or afraid that we may be in the shadow of darkness. As we ascribe our fears to this part of the creative process, it could quite possibly be reminding us that we are to bring light into the darkness in order to release the lie of the shadow.

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”  ― Martin Luther King Jr

Divine Light has the power to heal and empower our lives in ways that we may barely be able to comprehend. Lightworkers the world over are essentially truth workers, who by facing their own darkness, bravely shine the light and are willing to die the little ego deaths of negativity and distorted belief systems in order to be reborn into the light. This has a visceral effect on all life. For bringing in divine light is much more than a metaphor for the truth, though it is always brought forth through the vehicle of Truth. Spiritual Light is here for us to resource ourselves and remember ourselves in due course. It is a real and vital substance that we must learn how to summon and direct for the greater good of all. We must do this regularly and routinely in order to strengthen and awaken to the light of truth. Truth brings healing and redemption. Our task is to learn to trust in the process of creation.

“The Light is more than some abstract, unknowable energy force. Light is Truth. If Light is truth, then darkness must be lies. Each and every lie we tell to ourselves and others casts the shadow of separation upon us. Every time even the most minor deception is revealed and the truth is made known we are re-united with the Light. So, Let there be Light. Those are the words by which you can create your own magnificent world.” - Renee Bledsoe

Sunday Talks with Rev. Renee Bledsoe
December 01 - Divine Light: Fiat Luxe
December 08 - Devotion: The Rebirth of Divinity
December 15 - White Magic: Purity of Heart
December 22 - Winter Solstice Christmas - Sacred Altar Church in Circle
December 29 - Creating with Celestial Light

Divine Light Affirmations
I am a being of pure light..
Where I once created my life in darkness, I now turn everything into the light.
I refine my ability to create from love.
I create my life because of love.
I look for ever deepening enlightened expressions of  love.
I create and express the light of my soul.
I allow the light of my soul to be my guiding light.
I enter the darkness, knowing that all that lies outside of what is known to me is there.
Magic and miracles live in the unknown.
I courageously enter the mystery void of creation.
I reveal the light in all my dealings.
The truth will set me free.
The light resources me and gives me strength.
I turn the karma of my ancestral path into the light.
I heal and empower myself with the light of truth.
I am devoted to the Light.
Spiritual Light activates my soul.
My spirit is reborn in the flesh.
The divine mother within carefully tends my soul.
My mind is in service to my soul.
There is a saviour being born within me.
Moments of truth clarify my connection to my divinity.
I allow my divinity to be revealed.
The light of my soul reveals the purity of my heart.
I accept the light for my highest good.
I receive and activate the great spiritual light of the holy days.
I am conscious of greater depths of love.
My spiritual strength comes from the light of the creator.
Where there is truth, there is light. Where there is light, there is God.