The Prayer

I pray you'll be our eyes
And watch us where we go
And help us to be wise
In times when we don't know

Let this be our prayer
As we go our way
Lead us to a place
Guide us with your Grace
To a place where we'll be safe
La luce che tu dai

I pray we'll find your light
Nel cuore restera
And hold it in our hearts
A ricordarci che
When stars go out each night
L'eterna stella sei
Nella mia preghiera
Let this be our prayer
Quanta fede c'e
When shadows fill our day
Lead us to a place
Guide us with your grace

Give us faith so we'll be safe.
Sogniamo un mondo senza piu violenza

Un mondo di giustizia e di speranza
Ognuno dia la mano al suo vicino
Simbolo di pace e di fraternita

La forza che ci dai
We ask that life be kind
E'il desiderio che
And watch us from above
Ognuno trovi amore
We hope each soul will find
Intorno e dentro a se
Another soul to love

Let this be our prayer
Let this be our prayer
Just like every child
Just like every child

Needs to find a place,
Guide us with your grace
Give us faith so we'll be safe
E la fede che
Hai acceso in noi
Sento che ci salvera

READINGS

Before we can learn what is true and be affected by what is good, the things that stand in the way and resist have to be put aside. The old self must die before the new self can be conceived.
19. The Spirit of God stands for the Lord's mercy, which is portrayed as moving constantly, like a hen brooding over her eggs. What is being brooded over in this instance is what the Lord stores away in us, which throughout the Word is called "a remnant" [or "survivors"]. It is a knowledge of truth and goodness, which can never emerge into the light of day until our outer nature has been devastated. Such knowledge is here called the face of the water.
20. Genesis 1:3. And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light.
The first step is taken when we begin to realize that goodness and truth are something transcendent.
People who focus exclusively on externals do not even know what is good or what is true; everything connected with self-love and love of worldly advantages they consider good, and anything that promotes those two loves they consider true. They are unaware that such "goodness" is evil and such "truth" false.

When we are conceived anew, however, we first begin to be aware that our "good" is not good. And as we advance further into the light, it dawns on us that the Lord exists and that he is goodness and truth itself.

MESSAGE 

Helen Keller and the Arts

Helen Keller is the inspiration for many people with disabilities to express themselves through the arts.

At the core of Helen Keller’s life was her Swedenborgian faith, which she adopted at age 13.

"I do not know whether I adopted the faith, or the faith adopted me. I can only say that the heart of the young girl sitting with a big book of raised letters on her lap in the sublime sunshine was thrilled by a radiant presence and inexpressibly endearing voice … the teachings of Emanuel Swedenborg have been my light and a staff in my hand, and by his vision splendid I am attended on my way.


If you don’t know much about Helen Keller and Swedenborg, be sure to visit our page about her on our site. While there, you’ll be able to read the text of the talk she gave to our 1919 convention.

And you can read a sermon by her good friend and minister in the NY Church, Clayton Priestnal.

These are some of the words he spoke at her memorial service, after her death in 1968 at the age of 85.

"At least two foundation stones of Miss Keller's religious philosophy were hewn out of Swedenborg's teachings on the afterlife. The first was hope. She began to see clearly that this world was not an end in itself, but a seminary of heaven--a proving ground for the life eternal. Her faith assured her that she would not be burdened forever by sightlessness and a total inability to hear and distinguish sounds. Helen Keller could now look upon her handicaps as a challenge, as a means of spiritual growth, as an education for a future life when she would be able to see, hear, and speak without impediment. There was no bitterness in her towards divine providence, for she knew the Lord was good to all, and he was not in any way accountable for the visitation of a dreadful affliction. This hope that shone forth so radiantly in her personality shone into the dark corners of despair where sat others who were also without sight.
The other foundation stone of her faith was this: love and use are synonymous. Over and over again her thoughts turned to this basic doctrine of Swedenborg: "The kingdom of heaven is a kingdom of uses" (Heaven and Hell #387). This truth became the driving force of Miss Keller's life. Love has no reality, no existence, no meaning, until it goes forth into the lives of others in the form of some essential service."

As a teen-ager, Helen came to have many questions about spirituality. It so happened that a very prominent Swedenborgian wandered into her life about that time. He was John Hitz. He worked with Alexander Graham Bell in an organization to provide material about deafness. When Helen took her questions to him, he provided her with a Braille volume of his writing.

Reading it in Braille, she had a spiritual awakening similar to the one she had had years earlier with her teacher, Anne Sullivan when she realized at the water pump that letters had meaning.

Helen Keller was an ardent advocate of the rights of the disabled and others socially disadvantaged by society.

Eugene Taylor, Ph.D,  is a Swedenborgian who is a Lecturer on Psychiatry at the Harvard Medical School, and the 1983 Wiliam James Lecturer on the Varieties of Religious Experience at Harvard DivinitySchool.  In his book, A Psychology of Spiritual Healing, he writes this about art and disabilities: 

"Often, we think of sickness as something transitory; but for millions of people, illness is chronic, even lifelong.  The loss of limbs, a radical disfigurement, terrible pain, all of these my be permanent adjustments that a person has to make.  Chronic illness, however, can also be a stimulus to kinds of internal growth that would not have been other possible. … Beethoven composed symphonies while completely deaf.  Jackson Pollock, as well as numerous other artists, used conditions of psychopathology to produce new dimensions in modern art.   … while terrible things might happen to us, there is simply no telling what new doors will open up for us in our response to pain, sickness, and infirmity.  Our illness can always become the vehicle toward the actualization of a spiritual destiny higher than the physical or psychological."  [140-41]

Swedenborg wrote:  "There is a constant inflow from the spiritual world into the physical world.  [DLW 340] and The true principle of cure is the divine love brought by the Lord’s humanity and life of divine truth …" AC 571

The more we align with the spiritual influx, the more we are in a state of healing; regardless of the circumstances of the body.

Physicist Stephen Hawkins says of his severe disabilities:

"I guess we’re all pretty disabled on the cosmic scale.  What difference is a few muscles more or less?  Disability does not really affect my consciousness.  I see it as an inconvenience like color blindness."

Through reading Swedenborg, Helen Keller came to have a similar view on her disabilities.  It was only her physical sight and physical hearing that were impaired.  Internally, everyone has impairment of the spiritual eyes and ears.  Hers, however, were far more developed that for most people around her.

One of the art shows inspired by Helen Keller is for children in Alabama.   

The Helen Keller Art Show was established in 1983, as a project among agencies in Alabama that serve children with visual impairments. It presents winning entries of art by children who are visually impaired, blind and deafblind; using a variety of media. 

 
For Helen, her darkness was only to the physical world. Her spiritual eyes within saw God, giving her far clearer sight that those of us with physical seeing.

 We think of these as physical terms that describe aspects of our bodies.  To Helen Keller, they had a deeper spiritual meaning.   Ponder these “impairments” as spiritual, rather than physical.  How might they apply to your own spiritual life?  How does the hope of Helen Keller inspire you in your life’s journey today?

As you enjoy the following art work that was done for the Helen Keller Art Show, consider the concept of being “blind” or “deaf.” They have a spiritual meaning for all of us, and are healed through God’s inflowing Love.