by Deborah Globus

An interview with Lisa D'Alessio, Transformational Intuitive Master Healer

by Deborah Globus

And death is at your doorstep
And it will steal your innocence
But it will not steal your substance

But you are not alone in this
And you are not alone in this

- Mumford & Son

Last Thursday was the 24th anniversary of my friend's mother's death. Next year he'll be as old as she was when she died.

Another friend has lost so many of her beloveds this year that I've lost count.  That doesn't include the funerals that I've gone to in the last two months or the ones I haven't, like the ones in Newtown, CT.

And I live on Long Island where evidence of storm damage sneaks up on you around every turn: a fallen tree here, an exposed root ball there and I'm suddenly reminded of all that my extended "neighbors" have been through since the October.

In the face of all this grief it's hard to believe that I can make a difference.  Mine is just one small voice shouting out into the void, or so it feels.

Too many of us struggle with not feeling like we're enough. Especially when the griefs before us are so expansive, and felt so strongly by so very many. It can feel too big; and we feel too small.  Thankfully, there are rituals that can support us, if we seek them out.

by Deborah Globus

by Deborah Globus

Isaac and Ishmael at their father’s grave.  In Abraham’s place is an overturned chair.  Thus the stage is set in the bibliodrama Elizabeth is leading.

These two (half) brothers have not seen each other in no one knows how many years.  What do they say to one another?  You – Isaac, what do you say?  You – Ishmael, what do you say?

We answer, in character, each of us imagining how it went.

One of us suggests, “I’ve missed you brother; let us make peace”

Another imagines, “What are your intentions?”

Still another sees it this way, “This is my land.  Be gone!”

But I know this scene.  I have been here before.  

And suddenly I am no longer at “the grave” but in a hospital room, years earlier.  In the bed is my brother, 39 years old and steadily poisoning himself with alcohol.  Within a year he would be dead.

by Deborah Globus

Many wonder why I do this each and every year.  Maybe it’s because I’m a New Yorker and these were my people.  Maybe it’s because, as a “minister,” I feel as though it is my duty to  bare witness to those that grieve.

Or maybe it’s because I’m alive.

by Deborah Globus

An Advent Reflection for Begin Again 
and the Cloaked Monk

John 3:31-32
1 The one who comes from above is above all; the one who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks about earthly things. The one who comes from heaven is above all. 32 He testifies to what he has seen and heard, yet no one accepts his testimony.

Sometimes I think about how much of a bummer it must have been to be Jesus. 

by Deborah Globus

A friend of mine is celebrating an anniversary this week, except it isn’t really an event to celebrate.  

Really what she’s doing is honoring a milestone in an on-going process.

In our culture we’re big on the yearly anniversary but in other cultures (like the Celtic traditions) it’s the quest of a year and a day that holds real power.