Have I learned enough?

Wow where has this year gone and have I now learned enough?

For the last twelve years I have taken every opportunity to try out every piece of information available to me to grow into the spiritual being I was sent to earth to be. Over the years I have read and digested the philosophies of many others, keeping only what makes sense to me.

Back in 1972, while going through the ropes of becoming Catholic, I remember telling my soon to be godfather that life was hard. He in response replied, "Life isn't hard it is easy."

I didn't believe him at the time. Thomas (Tag) had diabetes and eventually had limbs removed and died as the result of the challenges he had been given. Although the reason I dabbled in Catholicism for the next 25 years was because I married a Catholic, Tag was the catalyst for my journey. I remember him telling me that after trying out other religions it made sense to him. In 1999 I decided I had experienced enough rituals and lectures and moved on to other things.

A friend, who as an adult changed his life and became a Buddhist, also had an influence on me. It led me to examine the easy flowing ways of Buddha. Although I had no desire to become a Buddhist it seemed to go along with what Tag had said so many years ago. Life is easy.

My religious experiences up to about age 20 had been sporadic. I was not baptized until I was 34. I mostly learned about the bible stories from the Masonic groups I belonged to as a teenager. I especially loved the words of St. John and the contents of the book of Job. In my humble opinion the bible was written by people like you and me and not by God. I am willing to agree it was the word of god, expressed through the minds of his children.

That brings me to the question of what Christmas means to me. Of course, as a child it meant gifts and because my family didn't have a lot of money they were not extravagant. Many were hand made by my parents, like the doll house from my father and doll clothes from my mother. I don't recall ever feeling that we were especially poor. I guess as a child I judged my life by what was and not what I wanted it to be.  Life is simple when you are young.

I do accept that Christmas is the celebration of the birth of Jesus. What I do not except is that he is my savior. St. John said, "god so loved the world  that he gave his ONLY begotten son". That makes no sense, when we are also asked to believe that we are ALL god's children. Jesus is my brother, not my savior. He was born because people could not believe in something they could not see. He was born, as all other enlightened souls were, to teach us how to love one another.

And that one word, LOVE, is what Christmas means to me.

A poem I wrote back in 2000 is as true today as the day I wrote it.

One Gift

If you could have one gift for Christmas
Tell me what would it be, someone asked.
Seriously poundering the question awhile
The gift I choose wouldn't be under the tree.

What I really want for Christmas
I told the person who had asked me
Is the most precious treasured gift of all,
LOVE, pure and simple and completely free.

(In memory of Thomas Earl Taggart)
                 1934-2001