From the World Society
On Being Free
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Dear Members and Friends of the Anthroposophical Society in Canada,
We stand together at the threshold of a new year. With each day the light pushes against the boundaries of dawn and sunset and with the growing light we feel the possibility, the hope for what might be. The disorientation of the year that has been, wraps around us with an insistent immediacy. Its closeness shrouds the mystery of what now can be in this coming year.
As with all thresholds, we hover between endings and beginnings, between the residue of what we have experienced and the open possibility of the space before us. We can experience this ‘hovering between’ as an invitation into a new beginning. We can also experience it as a hesitation, a holding back. We can become mired between the two. At the threshold of the year that has been, this hesitation comes of its own accord. We can experience the edge of paralysis. We can also experience the openness of hope.
This ‘being in between’ is the essence of all doorways, all thresholds. We leave the familiar and stand before the not yet formed. To hesitate, pondering, is part of a ‘state’ that seeks to become ‘process’. Unless we take the first step, we remain imprisoned in the transition that tries to realize itself. As we consider this tension, we can recognize that it calls up a fundamental challenge for us. We feel it physically, as if we are bound by invisible restraints. We feel unfree. Once recognized, we can realize that this sense of our freedom being impinged upon is part of the shadow of the year that has been. It is as if the conditions given to us over this past year have offered us the possibility to consider at a fundamental level what this experience of freedom is - whether this sense of freedom is also not a state but a process, something that we seek to move toward.
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Approaching the threshold of the Goetheanum’s Great Hall is such a process. Rising up two levels of sweeping helical staircases, whose very form carries us upward, we move through light filled spaces that gradually lead us into the dimly lit, sheltered space before the Great Hall’s entry. Here only a small group can comfortably stand. Great, heavy, deeply carved oak doors mark the ‘in between’. We have come from the complex fabric of our daily lives, risen high above the surrounding landscape, and now stand in quiet subdued light. Behind us, and above us, the great countenance of the scarlet window watches us. Before us, beyond the great oaken doors, the mighty presence of the Representative of Humanity is intended to meet us, face to face. |
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We must imagine this; it is important to imagine this, for these interrelationships are central to the very constitution, the body, of the Goetheanum.
As with all thresholds we are called to act. How do we choose to step into the space before us? Do we enter with an inner quietness, observant of what unfolds around us? Do we stride with confidence, sure of what we will meet? So it is, at every transition and, inseparable from it, our embodied experience of being ‘free,' free to act out of one’s own volition. Rudolf Steiner often calls us to pay careful attention to this enigma of freedom, for the gradual awakening of this experience is a long evolutionary process for all of humanity, one that we are still in the midst of. Central to the age that has come before us is this quest for the individual to come to the experience of standing and being in the world as ‘myself’ - independent, free of all the social constraints that have defined the individual person contextually. It has taken millennia for humanity to gradually begin to overcome the definitions of self, based on ethnicity or culture, religion or family, clan or tribe. Community determined the identity of the individual. Overcoming these constraints was the profoundly significant task of the age that came before ours. Being ‘free’ is gradually becoming deeply embedded in us, inseparable from our current experience of self. This developmental process for humanity is such a fundamental transformation that we are beginning to conflate our sense of self with this ‘independent individual’ who would stand freely in the world.
One of the great gifts of anthroposophy is that this quest for freedom is given its context. We are made aware that we now stand before a completely new stage in our development toward freedom. We are again at a threshold. The whole evolution of the intellectual soul stretches out behind us. Before us stands the immense task of awakening a completely new aspect of soul that has no precedent, the spiritual soul. Fundamental to the conditions of this new threshold is that we must face a deep, question. Having traveled the path toward the free individual, what has been accomplished? Of what significance is this experience of freedom? What does it now demand of us?
As with all fundamental stages of transformation, evolution does not stop. If we try to hold fast what has been accomplished, becoming free individuals, then this very sense of freedom becomes a constraint.
We become profoundly sensitive to whether our ‘freedom’ is at the centre of our collective societal agreements. We become defensive, even violently so, if we feel that the boundaries of ‘my freedom’ are constrained. How is a bridge to be built from all that has been accomplished to what now seeks to arise? We cannot begin to grasp this question without grappling with the tension between our sense of self and this enigma of freedom.
This new stage in human development first became a possibility for us in the 15th century. At first this newly developing soul, this spiritual soul, had to bring about an adaptation of the sentient soul. The Renaissance is the gift of this soul modulation. There then came a similar adaptive process for the intellectual soul. The gift of this process provides us with a new way of seeing the world - science. It was also at this time that three new principles were introduced into our collective consciousness. These principles had been cultivated within spiritual communities for some time and were now brought into the culture as the principles of liberty, equality, and fraternity. They first came as concepts that could be gradually understood, principles that could guide the development of inner capacities once these periods of adaptation were completed and the spiritual soul itself could begin to unfurl. This inner shifting began in the late 18th and into the 19th century. This was the prepared ground into which Rudolf Steiner could place and cultivate anthroposophy.
Anthroposophy now becomes the guidance for unfolding this third soul being within us. Rudolf Steiner describes for us that this is not a linear process. It is, as with all significant transformations, a fundamental re-organization in our soul life. As he describes for us, what must come about is a complete involution of how the intellectual soul functions. From this perspective, the perspective of the intellectual soul, we experience the call to liberty, equality, and fraternity as relating to ourselves. How do these principles ‘affect me’ is the orientation of the intellectual soul. With the awakening development of the spiritual soul the orientation is completely transmuted, and the orientation becomes ‘the other’. The challenge that the spiritual soul places before us is: How does what I do impinge upon your liberty, impinge upon your sense of equality, impinge upon your ability to truly experience yourself as my brother or sister? What had been centred on myself now becomes centred on the other. But this is not a matter of having sympathy for the other, or even having empathy for the other, it is ‘becoming’ the other. How does my insistence on my sense of freedom bind us, imprison us in a way of being that longs to transform itself?
Over this past year we have been repeatedly placed into this question. We have had to live this question. Has the extreme disruption of our accustomed patterns of life given us the possibility of practicing the development of this new capacity? Have we sought to experience how the other experiences, not as a thought or as a concept, but ‘actually experience’ the impact of what I demand for myself?
The journey toward this capacity fully living within us is a long one. At the same time can we see that the world situation, that all that we have lived through in this past year, is forever giving us the possibility to take a first step toward a way of being that is almost impossible for us to imagine?
Bert Chase
General Secretary
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Introducing Our New Council Member
Noemi Glen
Council for the Anthroposophical Society in Canada
Noemi Glen has been part of the anthroposophical community since her childhood, having been a Waldorf pupil. She was an active member of the North American Youth Section from 1995 to 2006, and has been working as a Waldorf teacher since 2002. During her time as a business management and marketing student, she collaborated in planning events for the Youth Section (anthroposophical lectures and workshops) both here (Canada and Quebec) and abroad. Since 2009, she has been part of the founding group for a new Waldorf school, and in this pioneering effort has been able to combine her different fields of interest. Many aspects of the planning work have made this school a viable entity: project management, finance, development plans and strategies, human resources and care for community spiritual life. She hopes now to be able to share this experience within the framework of the SAC, collaborating with a team of colleagues having differing backgrounds and skills, to develop a platform aimed at familiarising human beings with Anthroposophia and the path to spiritual awareness and warmth of heart, working towards finding a common goal for our times.
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GRAHAM HOWARD JACKSON
2 July 1931 ~ 27 December 27 2020
Graham was born in Toronto, the fifth child of eight, the youngest of five boys, the close companion of three younger sisters. The father was a theosophist, vegetarian, and raised the family as a religious, musical and social community. Graham became an excellent pianist in the family of musicians.
He attended the University of Toronto School of Music and was encouraged by his teacher Earle Moss, to become a concert pianist, but destiny had other plans. He discovered books by Rudolf Steiner in the library of the Theosophical Society. He found himself at Emerson College in England, with Francis Edmunds, studying Waldorf education and the foundations of anthroposophy. It was there he met Veronica Wegerif (from South Africa) who would become his wife shortly after their meeting!
Graham and Veronica then moved together to Toronto where two of their boys were born, Arthur and Kevin. Graham used his charismatic nature to draw people to a study group at Hill House on the background and spiritual understanding of Waldorf education. This would become part of the foundation for the Toronto Waldorf School.
In 1968 as the school began, he and Veronica were inspired by the ideals of Camphill life so they moved to Pennsylvania and joined Beaver Run where they worked as house parents. Graham contributed to the festival life, writing songs for the festivals and studying with Carlo Pietzner aspects of music and colour therapy. He was interested in the impact of music on the human spirit.
After about 7 years the family decided to move to South Africa to work on a Camphill outside of Cape Town where two more boys, Patrick and Francis were born. Graham was versatile and selfless when it came to community life. The family then decided to move back to USA. Through a series of circumstances, it turned out that only Graham left and the others, the mother and four boys, remained in South Africa. This was a difficult time.
Graham was an idealist. He was always looking for the alternative version of whatever life was presenting to him. He worked toward higher goals. They remained married for many years after the separation, working on what it meant to be in a ‘karmic’ relationship.
In the end, they both returned to Toronto. Veronica spent her last days at Hesperus and died on 18 February 2011.
Meanwhile he spent more time in research and moved into his family house in Toronto to care for his aging mother. Graham was a musician for the Christian Community and for eurythmy at TWS; he taught introductory courses on anthroposophy at Hill House and the new Rudolf Steiner Centre. He finally published his life-long work in a book entitled: ‘The Spiritual Basis of Musical Harmony’.
As Graham grew older he became less tolerant of others who did not agree with his point of view. He had fantasies about winning the lottery, (before the end of this year!) encouraged by a psychic. He clung to that hope, for a promised change in life, while living his life in a peaceful routine with son Arthur and family in Massachusetts. He had to give up his apartment in Richmond Hill and put his grand piano and library in storage. His name was on the wait list for Hesperus but destiny had another intent: he could contribute to humanity better from the spiritual side.
By the Grace of God, after two days of illness Graham died quietly in the night. He leaves behind four sons with tremendous heart forces and nine grandchildren; also brother Alan and sisters Ellen, Shirley and Lois. He is remembered for musical contributions to evening Soirees at Hesperus Village.
Rev Carol Kelly and Shirley van Houten
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Eugene Gollogly†
October 4, 1950 – January 7, 2021
This week’s letter bears the sad tidings of the sudden and unexpected loss of our dear friend and forever colleague, Gene Gollogly. For anyone who knew or ever encountered Gene, it will not be difficult to pause, look within, and behold him, livingly, in the soul space of recollection.
While it’s certainly true that each of us, as human beings, are “one-of-a kind,” a “species unto oneself,” still, there are those whose effortlessly intense one-of-a-kindness simply shines so brightly, radiates such warmth, that the sensibilities of the observer, the conversant, the beholder, can be dazzled by the energy and vigor of this radiant individuality. Such a one was Gene. The immensity of his spirit is and will remain a marvel and a joy, ever evolving. At turns dynamic, enigmatic, amusing, humble, serene, warm, wise, alive, these words are just a stumbling beginning of a description of the man.
It will be the task of others to write a fuller biography of his life, but here is a rough, tentative sketch. The fourth born of six, Gene began this life on October 4, 1950, in the village of Guisborough on the edge of the North Yorkshire Moors, a place celebrated for the nearby ruins of the Augustinian Priory of Mary (1119), which may well have awoken a memory of monastic spirituality deep within him.
His path into anthroposophy and the work of Rudolf Steiner happened at a relatively young age, not far from his childhood home, and seemed from the start to be connected with both books and community. Back in Yorkshire after completing his studies at the London School of Economics, Gene sought a place to offer service as a volunteer and chanced upon the Camphill Community of Botton Village, where he was engaged as short term volunteer. He was immediately interested in learning more about this unique place and whatever it was that lay behind it. (As a foreshadowing of destiny would have it, he had already at this time literally stumbled across a eurythmy performance, in Basel, while visiting his brother Jim. They went in, were much amazed and not a little perplexed, but they liked it, especially Gene.) In my recollection of Gene’s telling me this story of his initial connection to Botton, he emphasized the warmth and welcome he received there, which he connected, in part, to the fact that he had at that time recently lost his mother. He was cared for at Botton, and the people he would meet there, such as Brian and Anna Rée, played a big role in Gene’s life story as a whole. It was here he first encountered the art and practice of biodynamic agriculture, a lifelong interest, and it was at Botton where he met the writer, researcher, and editor of Rudolf Steiner’s works in English, Paul Marshall Allen and his wife Joan Allen.
Paul Marshall Allen provided the connection and the introduction to Bernard Garber of Blauvelt, New York, real estate man and publisher of various imprints and initiatives under the “Garber Communications” umbrella, including the Free Deeds magazine, Spiritual Science Library, (the “original”) SteinerBooks, and others. Feeling himself drawn both to the United States and to publishing, Gene came over to expand his horizons and to work for “Bernie” (at $100 a week—not good even in those days). This was the beginning of Gene’s lifelong connection with and love of the business of publishing.
It was both anthroposophy and publishing, then, that brought Gene to the United States as a young man, and he remained connected and dedicated to both. Requiring at a certain point, better wages for his work, Gene left Mr. Garber (on very good terms) and entered the world of New York City publishing where he spent the next decades of his life working for various publishing houses, initially with a focus in religious publishing.
Later, while working at Continuum Publishing, he met his future business partner, Martin Rowe, with whom he co-founded Lantern Books, in 1999. Not long after the turn of the century, Gene, who was already also on the board of the Anthroposophic Press, took on the additional role of President and CEO of this non-profit corporation established in 1928 by Henry Monges, a growing business in the year 2000, but experiencing as well some pains of growth. He had, in a way, come full circle back to anthroposophical publishing. Still living full time in New York City with his family and co-managing the affairs of Lantern, Gene also energetically took hold of this company, immediately solving an urgent financial dilemma, initiating the annual Spiritual Science Research Seminars at NYU, bringing the name “SteinerBooks” to bear on the company (as a legal alias), and beginning his tireless travels on behalf of publishing, anthroposophy, and the practical work of spiritual science in the world—most notably, perhaps, for anthroposophically-extended medicine and biodynamics, but none were excluded.
He was genuinely interested in everything and every body, right up until the very “end,” which, as Gene well knew and often spoke of, is not, in fact, the end. Most recently, and perhaps presciently, Gene had taken an interest in the work of “Sacred Undertaking,” the art and practical skill of caring for the dead holistically and at home, informed by the knowledge of this transition as deepened and clarified by spiritual science. He assisted in a home funeral and carried the coffin of an acquaintance the day before he himself died.
I’m sure I speak for all of us at SteinerBooks, staff and board, past and present, when I say I will be forever grateful for the time I was privileged to spend with Gene. Our conversations, his advice, freely given, his deep connections to anthroposophy and the work of Rudolf Steiner, and his tireless work and advocacy for a more widespread knowledge and acceptance of Steiner’s work as crucial for the future of humanity remain imbued with the strength and truth of his conviction.
Gene, as is well known, was a world traveler with an unrivaled endurance for the road, the plane, the train, the car. He was never one to linger. His, to us, hasty and decisive exit from this mortal coil was, in its way, thoroughly characteristic. The mantras of encouragement he often bestowed on me and others of us at SteinerBooks, were both succinct and profound. Here are two of my favorites: “Don’t get stuck!” (i.e. keep moving forward with your work, don’t let mishaps, missteps, or mistakes deter you from forward progress in your life and in your work!) “You never know the future!” (i.e. destiny events have a way of helping us see more clearly, but these can be drastically unexpected: accept whatever life brings and keep learning from it!)
What a man. God bless him. God bless us all.
—JSL (with assistance from Christopher Bamford)
Into cosmic distances I will carry
My feeling heart, so that it grows warm
In the fire of the holy forces’ working;
Into cosmic thoughts I will weave
My own thinking, so that it grows clear
In the light of eternal life-becoming;
Into depths of soul I will sink
Devoted contemplation, so that it grows strong
For the true goals of human activity.
In the peace of God I strive thus
Amidst life’s battles and cares
To prepare myself for the higher Self;
Aspiring to work in joy-filled peace,
Sensing cosmic being in my own being,
I seek to fulfill my human duty;
May I live then in anticipation,
Oriented toward my soul’s star
Which gives me my place in spirit realms.
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GOETHEANUM COURSES 2021/2022 |
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GOETHEANUM ANTHROPOSOPHY STUDIES
The "Goetheanum Anthroposophy Studies" provide, especially for young people, the possibility of getting to know the foundations of Anthroposophy. The Goetheanum as a cosmopolitan place, provides the space for human encounters, spiritual discovery and skills training.
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GOETHEANUM ADULT EDUCATION PROGRAMME
Teaching Anthroposophy today
Practices - Challenges - Paradigms
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GOETHEANUM LEADERSHIP COURSE
Entrepreneurial Leadership in a Complex and Challenging World.
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Branch Information and Upcoming Events |
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Branches & Groups
Calgary Branch
Contact: Christine at
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Cantons de l'Est
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Confluence of Three Rivers (Ottawa)
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Duncan
Contact:
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Edmonton
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Huronia Branch (Barrie)
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London
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Montréal (Français)
Institute Rudolf Steiner Quebec
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Montreal Branch (English)
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Nelson, BC
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Nova Scotia
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Polaris Branch (Thornhill)
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Saugeen Cedar Branch
(Durham)
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Sherbrooke (Français)
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Sunshine Coast (BC)
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Thornhill Group
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Toronto Branch
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Vancouver
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Val David (Français)
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Victoria
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Membership Update
New Members
Mark McGivern (Victoria, BC)
Irena Zenewych (Bridgetown, NS)
Shiyu Huang (Cowichan Bay, BC)
Molly Graham (Roberts Creek, BC)
WELCOME
Deceased
Graham Howard Jackson, ON
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Editorial Notes
The eNews is published 10 times per year for members of the Anthroposophical Society In Canada.
Please send correspondence and articles in either Word doc or ipages without formatting except for paragraphs to before the 15th of the month before publication. If you are including photographs please also attach a pdf showing placement. Articles over 2,500 words may be edited.
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Contact Info
Anthroposophical Society in Canada
# 130A - 1 Hesperus Rd.
Thornhill, ON
L4J 0G9
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Claudette Leblanc
416-892-3656 (Toronto area)
877-892-3656 (Freephone)
Communication Administrator
Jef Saunders
Members website
please note you will need to use the password ASC to access the members only page.
Council
President
Treasurer
Secretary
General Secretary
School For Spiritual Science
For list of Class Holders,
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The Anthroposophical Meditative Path: Seven Interactive Zoom Sessions
You are cordially invited to a seven week Zoom workshop on anthroposophical meditation. These sessions are open to all but assume some familiarity with anthroposophy. The purpose of these sessions will be to understand and practice anthroposophical meditations and to discuss our experiences of the work. The sessions will be held on seven consecutive Sundays from 7 pm to 8:30 pm (ET) beginning on January 24th. Each session will include a brief talk, some experiential work, breakout groups, and plenary group discussions. Optional reading materials will be sent out prior to each session for those who want to prepare for the sessions. Each session is a standalone event so you can come to one or all of them as you wish. There is no fee for the event but a donation to the Anthroposophical Society in Canada would be greatly appreciated. To make a donation please see https://www.canadahelps.org/en/charities/the-anthroposophical-society-in-canada-inc/ (in the Message box write: Toronto Branch).
Please RSVP to Toronto.ASC@gmail.com to be included in the workshop email list and to receive the Zoom links.
Sunday, January 24 - 7pm to 8:30pm
Finding Hidden Thresholds in Everyday Experience:
An Introduction to the Anthroposophical Path of Knowledge with Robert McKay
Sunday, January 31 - 7pm to 8:30pm
An Orientation to the Anthroposophical Meditative Tool Box:
Which one does what; why does it do that and how will it feel? With Robert McKay
Sunday, February 7 - 7pm to 8:30pm
Writing as a Way to Cultivate Inner Culture:
You know more than you think you do!
With Yuri Curumthaully
Sunday, February 14 - 7pm to 8:30pm
Dr. Steiner's Suite of Karma Meditations:
How to Uncover the Occult Purposes of Life Events with Grant Davis
Sunday, February 21 - 7pm to 8:30pm
Your Higher Self and the Great Rosicrucian Mantra:
The Mystery of the Trinity in Human Unfolding with Filip Karadzic
Sunday, February 28 - 7pm to 8:30pm
The Rose Cross Meditation:
Opening and Strengthening the Higher Self with Lois Macaulay
Sunday, March 7 - 7pm to 8:30pm
Building an Effective Meditative Regimen:
The Path of Knowledge as Relationship and Service with Robert McKay
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ANTHROPOSOPHICAL SOCIETY IN CANADA - ONLINE |
The Consciousness Soul in Personal Development and World Events
The Consciousness Soul in Personal Development and World Events
Rob McKay and Mark McGivern, active members of the ASC Branch and Membership Development Mandate Group, will offer a three-part participatory workshop on distinguishing between sentient, intellectual and consciousness soul, the role we play in developing our own consciousness soul, and the emergent symptoms of the consciousness soul in the events of our time.
Within each workshop time will also be devoted to branch development activities. We will offer a series of possible focus questions for coordinated branch work and ask members to individually prioritize them, and collaboratively in small groups. From this we will collectively ascertain the themes and topics of future gatherings.
A Zoom link will be sent closer to the date.
Sunday February 14th, Valentines Day,
1pm PST, 4pm EST
Qualities of the Sentient, Intellectual, and Conscious Soul
March 14th, Mother's Day,
1pm PST, 4pm EST
Personal Development of Consciousness Soul
April 11th, 1pm PST, 4pm EST
The Consciousness Soul in World Events
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Anthroposophy Worldwide - 2021
The first edition of the year is a joint January/February and will be available in the February eNews.
If you would like to see the archive of past issues, go to: Archive
then, if required, enter password AWE-2018
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