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ISBN: 9781098310899
Introduction
Within every human soul lies the heart of a priest. This priestly potential is like a seed in the soil of our soul waiting to sprout. We find this truth revealed at the end of the Book of Revelation in The New Testament. It is there that we read that all human beings have been made into priests because we can see God in everything, in everyone we encounter. In the ‘New Jerusalem,’ there is no more temple or church; everywhere becomes a place to encounter God. This means that to become priestly is actually the destiny of every human heart. It is implanted in us as a seed. Our job is to water this seed of becoming and align ourselves with its flowering.
In the present work “From Disciples to Apostles,” Rev. Patrick Kennedy describes this seed in us, this seed of our true humanity, as a rose seed. He then asks us to imagine its flowering - that Jesus is actually the rose of our humanity, the one in whose image and likeness we are all to become.
The journey Rev. Kennedy then skillfully guides us on is a journey that leads us not only to our priestly nature, but to our highest becoming. We are all called to become in the likeness of Jesus. In this light then, cultivating a relationship with Christ Jesus means to align ourselves with the flowering of our truest potential. As Rev. Kennedy beautifully describes, seeking His presence, praying to Him for help, asking for His guidance and allowing His power to work through us gives us the ‘water’ we need for our truest selves.
May these words from Rev. Kennedy lay a spiritual foundation for the culture of our Seminary. For the path and practice of cultivating a prayerful relationship with Christ Jesus is the very basis of the new priesthood, as well as our path toward our true humanity.
June 2019 Toronto
Rev. Jonah Evans
From Disciples to Apostles
“For the time will come, with the coming of Christ, the ever-present Christ, when human beings will learn to ask advice, not only for their own souls, but for what they want to accomplish, to found here on earth through their eternal natures – to ask, to put questions to the Christ Being. Christ is not a ruler of human beings, he is a brother who wants to be asked in every detail of life…The time must come…when the human soul will see beside him the Christ as loving companion in all circumstances of life and receive from him, not only comfort, not only strength, but also receive advice concerning what should happen.”
- Rudolf Steiner in “Cosmic and Human Metamorphoses”, Berlin, February 6th, 1917
The following article is in no way meant to be an historical treatment of what transformed the disciples of Jesus into the Apostles of Christ. It is an article based on a course that was given at The Seminary of the Christian Community in Hamburg, Germany. It was given, therefore, to people who were moving closer towards the reality of ordination and the question of serving humanity through the office of pastor and priest. What lived in my soul at the time was a kind of deep sense of responsibility towards their future: “What can I possibly give them that will provide the most support for their calling to serve Christ in our time?” The course therefore did not seek so much to look at the mystery of the transformation of the disciples into apostles with the distanced gaze of ‘history.’ Instead, it sought to discover the inner architecture, the spiritual processes whereby we, too, may move into discipleship, into becoming living students of the risen Christ on the way to becoming sent out into the world (Apostles) to do his work of healing wherever we are called.