The world is one mixed-up muddled-up place. We have problems galore and few solutions. The solutions we think we have are the subject of left-wing, right-wing name-calling and blame-gaming. Most of our collective problems have one source: greed. The love of money, it turns out, is indeed the root of all evil.

God had an idea we humans would act like this, so way back in the time of Moses He laid out a practical plan to deflate greed and maintain compassionate economic fairness. He even made it enticing and the Jews considered it a high holy-day (holiday) with feasting and merriment. But even Jews don’t practice it today.

I think God was on to something. I think it’s time to ACTUALLY trust that our Holy Parent might know a thing or two and give His plan a chance.  Let’s Jubilee!  ~ Libby

The Jubilee Atonement

Atonement gets plenty of attention in the Bible. “The Bible’s central message is atonement; that God has provided a way for humankind to come back into harmonious relationship with Him.” (Baker’s Evangelical Dictionary) The atonement is the entire purpose and subject matter of A Course in Miracles. Atonement for one’s deeds is a central tenet to the teachings of Alcoholics Anonymous. At a much-publicized recent gathering inTexas, Rick Perry (whether you like him or not) called for a “day of prayer and atonement for a nation in crisis.”

Do you even know the meaning of the word?

Atonement can mean ‘the making of amends or reparation for an offense of injury; satisfaction.’ It can mean ‘the reconciliation between God and people,’ often seen as the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ. In Christian Science, atonement means ‘the exemplifying of human oneness with God.’ Charles Fillmore, founder of Unity, defines atonement as “reconciliation of God and man through Christ; the uniting of our consciousness with the higher consciousness.” We have our atonement through Christ, and for this purpose Jesus demonstrated “the way.”

The word actually defines itself: at-one-ment, perfect reconciliation between you and God, united in consciousness as one mind, fully becoming the Christ by following for yourself, in your own unique manner, the way, the truth and the life of Jesus the Christ.

Tragically, the pure idea of atonement became attached to the ancient image of blood and gore: the sacrifice of animals on the altar to God, which morphed into the son of God being the blood sacrifice that would atone for all of us…Please – blood sacrifice is not what atonement is about. Atonement is about humility and renunciation of whatever it is that separates us from God. It’s time to detach old, grotesque ideas from your understanding of the atonement. Surely we’ve grown up enough to realize that blood sacrifice isn’t the way to God!

Atonement = At-One-ment. Not separate: whole.

Oneness with Source, the Creator of All-that-Is, the cosmic Father-Mother.

One with all beings and all beingness.

Yom Kippur

Translated as the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur is the holiest day of the year for Jews. Even Jews who do not otherwise observe Jewish holidays observe Yom Kippur, much like secular Christians observe Christmas and Easter if nothing else. Yom Kippur happens in the early fall, the final day of a week-long celebration beginning with Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year. The intervening days are called the Days of Awe, ‘awe’ meaning humility before the awesome power of the Almighty. Yom Kippur, atonement, is commanded by God in the Law of Moses as a day of being humble before God as a people. The Jews of the Old Testament sacrificed a bullock (male calf), two goats and a ram or lamb on the altar of God in atonement for the sins of the people. The rituals were elaborate and followed to the letter. What most people don’t know is that animal sacrifice was common among hunter-gatherers way before sacrifice was written down as a ritual in the Old Testament writings, so perhaps God was simply using an already-ancient custom to symbolize a spiritual truth…

Yom Kippur is approached with fasting and prayer and rest. It takes serious personal reflection to commit to the Day of Atonement because this is a time commanded by God for personal forgiveness: everyone forgives everyone else for all slights and harms and misdeeds and misperceptions. After the ritual of personal forgiveness, the Jewish congregation speaks together three times: “May all the people of Israel be forgiven, including the strangers who live in their midst, for all the people are in fault.”

We need atonement, for all the people are in fault.

The Jubilee Year

Every 50 years (give or take) on Yom Kippur, the joyful shout of trumpets announced the Jewish year of Jubilee. The Jubilee year was actually a two year period of magnified atonement, restitution and restoration, during which even the land was left uncultivated so that the earth herself could rest. Debts were cancelled, slaves were emancipated and land that had been sold reverted to the former owners. Woo hoo! The Jubilee was a time of joyous introspection, rest, renewal and celebration. The Jubilee year is actually a command from YHWH given to Moses on Mt.Sinai for the benefit of the Israelites, an extension of the idea of the Sabbath, the seventh day of the week during which Jews were commanded to rest and focus on their God YHWH. The Jubilee year allowed God’s people and their land to rest and begin again, liberated from the bondage of debt or slavery. You can read all about it in Leviticus, Chapter 25.

YHWH was trying to establish a systematic program of forgiveness for the people, a kind of re-set button to prevent the extremes of poverty and uber-wealth we see in the world today. YHWH was offering us a gift of profound grace with His command, teaching us to extend the concepts of times for activity and rest, forgiveness and humility into all aspects of our lives, including the life of our earth, our families, communities, and even nations. Sadly, the practice of Jubilee generally died out during the Babylonian captivity of the Hebrew people, and there is no longer any agreement about when the next actual jubilee year might be.

However, it is becoming very clear: if we do not act voluntarily to forgive debt (use YHWH’s system), the human-created greed-machine system will do it. With violence.

Let’s declare a Jubilee Atonement!

Atonement is a matter of consciousness, not time – so any time is the right time. What if we simply declare the Jubilee RIGHT NOW? Since the Jews haven’t called it in centuries, we could begin a Jubilee that lasts until “Israel [Israel means ‘he who wrestles with God’ or in other words, me and you!] is cleansed from all guilt of fornication and uncleanness, pollution, sin and error, and dwells with confidence in all the land, and there will be no more a satan or any evil one, and the land will be clean from that time for evermore.” (Book of Jubilees)

Part 1: Debt

What would your life be like if you were not a slave to debt? Romans 18:8-10 (NIV):

“Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for he who loves his fellowman has fulfilled the law. The commandments, “Do not commit adultery,” “Do not murder,” “Do not steal,” “Do not covet,” and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this one rule: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.”

Like it or not, St. Paul’s view in Romans is quite similar to the Muslim view of debt. The longest ayah (book) in the Quran is the ayah of debt. Muslims are strongly encouraged to buy only what they have money for, agree to a fixed price and avoid interest. Muslims believe that people in debt speak lies, break promises and will find it difficult to enterParadise.

What would your life be like…no mortgage on the house or loan on your car(s), no credit card bills, the IRS off your back, no medical bills or college loans, no payments to parents or friends or poker buddies, nothing owed to the title loan company…

Did you feel a sense of longing? Do you feel like it would be easier to love yourself, love your family and even love the world without the stress of being a slave to debt?

Could you be able to relieve others of their debts to you? What about those loans to people you know will never pay you back? Could you actually forgive your debts and debtors?

The ladder of debt forgiveness could extend higher and further: what if all banks forgave all loans and every loan the banks owed was also forgiven, all the way up and down the line? Could it work? What if theUSgovernment forgave all loans to states and cities? What if every country forgave loans owed by other countries? What if we all just declared do-overs?

What if we actually had the courage to use God’s system, the Jubilee Year re-set button?

As I write, a hopeful sign that people are getting the message has emerged: there is a movement in theUnited Statesto boost the economy by forgiving all student loan debt.

But don’t wait. Everything begins at the level of you and me. Robert F. Kennedy said “Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation… it is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is thus shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.”

It’s up to us to do what we can do. If someone owes you money and you are doing okay without it, forgive the debt! Suggest the forgiven party to ‘pay it forward’ and forgive another’s debt. Can you feel the healing potential inherent in this idea? Can you feel the ‘pay it forward’ sweeping around the globe?

Part 2: Forgiveness

Can you forgive? When you’re keeping score or holding a grudge, you keep yourself and the other in bondage, attached to the past and unable to move on. Forgiveness offers freedom from bondage to the past. Did you just think of someone? Forgive! Remember, all the people are in fault, including you. Expand your mind and think of more you could forgive. Maybe you could forgive your ex for being such an ass. Maybe you could forgive your parents or your neighbor or the guy who cut you off in traffic. Maybe you could forgive your former boss for laying you off when he had no choice. Maybe you could forgive the politicians or the media or the terrorists or the Wall Street bigwigs or the corporatist manipulators…this forgiveness thing can (and must) be extended: religions must forgive other religions, nations must forgive other nations, races must forgive religions and nations – none of us are free when we live in bondage to our communal past, to ancient hurts and out-dated ideas.

Our deep desire is the perfect freedom of being forgiven. But real, lasting forgiveness has another requirement.

Part 3: Humility

The alcoholic knows the drill: Alcoholics Anonymous makes sure of it. Just like the alcoholic, we all need to make amends or reparations to be deserving of forgiveness. We need to humble ourselves, apologize and come clean before the person we harmed. Humility is not the American way, but it is Yahweh. It is the way of the Christ. Jesus humbled himself and became a servant to humanity and remains so. The Pope needs to apologize to abused children and Catholic parents and American Indians and Africans and Jews to make the Catholic Church deserving of forgiveness. The United States of America needs to apologize to Iraq and Afghanistan (among others) for bombing their women and babies and calling it collateral damage. We need to apologize to Mexico for demanding their money-producing crops and their people for low-wage employment and then punishing them for answering our calls. BP and Exxon and hundreds of other corporations need to apologize for having so little regard for the earth and for humanity. Wall Street and Congress need to apologize for creating such a financial mess. We need to see remorse and shame and responsibility to be able to forgive.

Humility is cleansing. It purifies the soul. Humility restores relationships, from the individual to national to global.

Part 4: Sacrifice

“What is the real meaning of sacrifice? It is the cost of believing in illusions. It is the price that must be paid for the denial of truth.” (A Course in Miracles)

In the spirit of the symbolism of the Hebrew blood sacrifice, I pray:

Holy YHWH, I offer myself upon Your altar of at-one-ment. I accept your gift of grace. My offering to You is my stubborn bullish nature. I offer my dual goat nature, my arrogant ego and my shadowy scapegoat. I offer myself as the lamb, humbled, cleansed and purified. Together with Jesus the Christ I atone for the sins of the world. I apologize for us all, YHWH. I choose to see through the illusions. I will not deny the truth. Father-Mother, forgive us for we know not what we do. Amen

As above, so below

Isaiah 47:11 says “But evil shall come upon you, which you will not know how to charm away; disaster shall fall upon you, for which you will not be able to atone; and ruin shall come upon you suddenly, of which you know nothing.”

Disaster has befallen us for which we are not able to atone. Ruin is upon us and we certainly seem to know nothing. We need God’s wisdom. We need God’s inspiration. Albert Einstein said “A new type of thinking is essential if mankind is to survive and move toward higher levels.” We need You, YHWH.

Take heart! A Course in Miracles says “There is no order of difficulty in miracles. One is not “harder” or “bigger” than another. They are all the same. All expressions of love are maximal.” God (by any name) can do this “save the world” thing – all He asks is that we follow His system.

American Indian prophecies point to the current human predicament, and all agree that by a return to the ways of “the people,” our Earth and humankind will not only survive, but thrive. As a culture, “the people” do not share our concept of personal ownership or possession. One practice that is common to almost every American Indian nation is called a “giveaway,” and if you attend a powwow or any other ceremonial event, you may witness a giveaway. Giving is central to being an American Indian, a way of giving thanks, bestowing honor, teaching about relationship, distributing goods for the survival of all and for maintaining balance within the community.

Sounds like the American Indians lived a heavenly life of giving and receiving. I’m for returning to the ways of “the people.”

Until then, why not try God’s cosmic re-set button?

Let’s be free.

Let’s Jubilee!