They don’t want our prayers in Florida. This statement came from someone after the latest school shooting. I heard that and I don’t blame them. How many prayers can we say and still not do anything about the lives that are lost each day to gun violence? How can we just sit here and pray and not do anything? I know there must be an answer and I, for one, do not like sitting idly by hoping and wishing that something would change.

What is the answer and what can we do? I know that we cannot have a change if we are not willing to let go of the cause that created the effect to begin with. If we are still living in hate and fear and anger about anything in our own lives or the world around us, we cannot hope to change the outside. We live in a mental Universe and there is not way around this point for me.

So, other than calling my senators, congressman and writing letters and standing in protest to gun violence, I do not know what to do besides pray and clean up my own life.

There is a tradition in Hawaiian culture called Ho’oponono. We might be familiar with it or not, so I will share it here. The premise is that whatever is happening in the world is an outpicturing of our own individual consciousness. The subjective consciousness that we all share is creating this violence and turmoil. We might want to think we are loving and that is not possible, but in reality, “if you spot it, you got it.”

In Ho’oponono, we sit with ourselves and speak these words, “I’m sorry. Please forgive me. Thank you. I love you.” We are speaking to our higher selves, asking forgiveness for where we separated from our True Selves (God) or whatever you choose to call it. We are literally forgiving ourselves. Thanking ourselves for the forgiveness and realizing that love is all there is. These are not just words and there is proof that those who practice this principle do heal their own lives, and thus it trickles out into the experience the life of the planet.

Yes, prayers are not enough. They are aimless words and mumblings unless we back them by real action. Are we walking our prayers? Are we cleaning up our own lives or do we still complain, live in lack, hold back our love, live in discouragement? Are we living our passions? Are we moving out from our own woes and giving to others? Are we making changes in our lives by thinking differently and breaking old habits that don’t serve us?

Someone used to say to me, “charity begins at home.” I used to think this meant we should only take care of our family and those close to us. However, now I know that it means charity begins within. The more we can love ourselves and live our lives full-out, the more we will have to give to others. Let us stop condemning and start blessing ourselves and others.

Sitting here thinking there is nothing we can do is a lie.  There is plenty we can do, and it all begins with us. Today, let us continue to clean up our own house (our house within). If these violent acts are still happening in the world, there is still lots of work to do.

I will not give up doing my part, until the lion does lay down with the lamb.  And… I will keep praying because my form of prayer, Spiritual Mind Treatment assists me in changing my own consciousness about whatever is happening and that makes a difference in the collective race consciousness. “One alone with the Infinite constitutes a complete majority.”

Love and Aloha,

Rev. Rita