this article speaks to the work of spiritual author and mystic Andrew Harvey. Harvey has been an active participant in the global change movements. He is a well respected person who has studied various religions from the Hindu and Buddhist varieties to the Middle Eastern religions that include Christianity.

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By Merry and Burl Hall

The first part of this article was written by Merry.

You hear lots of people who are vibrating on a higher level quote Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, "We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience." This is a deep insight, but we say there is an even deeper (and simultaneously more exalted) insight. Either/or thinking is still dualistic thinking at work, segregating us into separate dueling camps. The truth more nearly is this: "We are human beings having a spiritual experience; AND we are spiritual beings having a human experience."

The glorious mystery is that both perspectives coexist simultaneously: we are the manifest experiencing the unmanifest and the unmanifest experiencing the manifest. We exist simultaneously in the here/now of space and time and in the incorporeal/immortal of infinity and eternity. In the terms of quantum physics, we are at once both particle and wave. We are the "designated observers" and we are the observed. It is crucial to humanity and Earth at this critical time that we live up to this calling.

There is a reason we represent infinity as a loop, not as a line. We are the quintessential Mobius loop. We are mirrors to nature, and nature mirrors us. That which is within us is correspondingly without. That which we are we can love; that which we love we can recreate. We are participants in the All. We are walking, talking life and love. How magnificent!

Wave does not supersede particle. One perspective is not superior to the other in some absolute hierarchy. The two are complementary, essential to the existence and fulfillment of the other. Without creation there is no creator. Without other there is no love. Without male and female there is no conception. Without the observed there is no observer. Without form there is no function. The child makes a father of the man and a mother of the woman. We crown God with our recognition and praise of Him.

We are blessed to exist in both capacities as wave and particle, as creature and co-creator. We are cursed in being blind to this mysterious paradox. When experiencing (focusing upon; dwelling within) one or the other, we become mostly oblivious to the other. Providentially, we have many bridges between the two.

Dreams are one such bridge by which our spiritual being is intimately connected to our bodily being. The collective Mind informs the discreet brain. Stories are another such bridge. The human being expresses the eternal truth in concrete terms. Sacraments are a holy bridge as is Prayer and Praise. Music reconnects us to the stars. Metaphor reconnects the seemingly disconnected.

The unmanifest and the manifest exist reciprocally in constant loving communion. As a metaphor, consider the blossom and the honeybee. They are symbiotic. Together they offer sweetness and nourishment to life. They are participants in a living, loving miracle; so are we.

God-Godess begot the Christ in us of its own divine substance. There is no other substance from which to create. Life, Truth, and Love take form through us. Isn't that (aren't we) an awesome Realization?! Let us be, embody, and enact that realization in the here and now that calls us forth with such anguish. Let us stop degrading our humanity.

No one currently expresses our fully divine yet also deeply human nature more so than Andrew Harvey. We were not only honored but also deeply moved to interview him. Our gratitude overflowed for all he shared with us in his episode of Envision This! It is so wonderful when someone speaks "my" heart (our heart; humanity's heart) in such an eloquent way. Listen to the man speak on You-tube, through the Shift Network, at his website (www.andrewharvey.net), or on our radio show. He is a powerhouse.

Andrew Harvey is Founder and Director of the Institute of Sacred Activism (www.andrewharvey.net/sacred-activism), an international organization focused on inviting concerned people to take up the challenge of our contemporary global crises. Sacred Activism is a transforming force of compassion-in-action that is born of a fusion of deep spiritual knowledge, courage, love, and passion, with wise radical action in the world. The large-scale practice of Sacred Activism can become an essential force for preserving and healing the planet and its inhabitants.

Andrew thus fosters our becoming inspired, effective, and practical agents of institutional and systemic change, in order to create peace and sustainability. He also wrote The Hope, which received the 2011 Nautilus Silver Award for its fostering social change. This book helps people to respond to current day challenges. It furthermore serves as an inspiration to do something through Sacred Activism, which entails the transforming force of Sophia (Wisdom), Eros (Love, Desire, Passion) and Episteme (Understanding and Compassion).

In 2012, Andrew published his Radical Passion: Sacred Love and Wisdom in Action. This book was published by North Atlantic Books. This work heals the great divide between spiritual resignation and engaged spiritual activism. It is a manifesto for the transformation or evolution of the world through the fusion of deep mystical peace with the clarity of radical wisdom. The book is a wakeup call to foster love and compassion leading to urgent and focused action. Yes, Andrew is not a talking head. He puts his words into action!

May we all follow suit.

According to Andrew, we are enveloped in a global crisis as reflected by mass media outlets such as CNN and Fox News which engage in a drama show acted out by a circus of clowns, e.g., Trump! He states that we are in a massive global crisis reflected by a mass media addicted to violence and trivialization.

These horror shows are occurring at a moment when what the world needs is profound inspiration. That inspiration is towards a return to the heart-centered way of the Divine Feminine, the words of the mystics throughout the ages and spiritual systems (e.g., the Sufis of Muslim, the Hindu mystics, the Christian mystics), and the cultivation of the nonviolent philosophies of Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Aung San Suu Kyi, and the Dali Lama.

He was the subject of a 1993 BBC documentary titled The Making of a Modern Mystic. In Andrew's world, being a mystic is NOT about sitting on a cushion and not doing anything in the external world. Indeed, he states the true Nature of Christ, and other great mystics across the world within various systems, are about confronting the status quo. Take Meister Eckhart, a 14^th century mystic and monk who was excommunicated from the Catholic Church due to his telling peasants they were all one with God!

In other words, the man did not sit on his backside and meditate all day long into escapism. Indeed, he was into fostering the Divinity within all those he taught. Eckhart was not one to believe in standardized testing! Education for him was according to its epistemological roots, to unfold. Unfold what? Unfold the potential within you.

Andrew Harvey was also the subject of a 1993 BBC film documentary, The Making of a Modern Mystic. He also appears in Rumi Turning Ecstatic and The Consciousness of Christ: Reclaiming Jesus for a New Humanity. He has furthermore worked with an Iranian Sufi Dancer, Banfsheh Sayyad, in producing a film In the Fire of Grace, which marries Sufi inspired dances to the stages of Rumi's understanding of Divine Love.

As Meister Eckhart was a deep influence on me, Harvey moves all of us into a journey within ourselves. This is what all mystics do. They point you within. It is there the power, the Sacred Grail is found. Thus, Harvey takes us into a realm where the Unmanifest opens up to unfold the potentials with us.

Consider the following from the Christian mystic Jacob Boehme who wrote about our process of creativity and awakening:

For the Nothing (the Virgin Mary) causeth the Willing (Eros), that it is Desirous; and the Desiring is an Imagination"Wherein the Will, in the Looking Glass of Sophia, discovereth It Self".and impregnate It Self with the Imagination out of the Sophia, viz; out of the Virgin like Looking Glass, which there is a Mother".for the Will, viz, the Father, speaketh in the Looking Glass of Sophia"and opens the Word of Life (Logos).

Thus is our conception. Mommy and Daddy made whoopee! This is how we are here both in our imagination and in our bodies. We are spiritual beings and human beings all in one. We are indeed a mystery.

Have you ever said to yourself, "God, the idea came out of nowhere?" Or, perhaps, "the idea came out of the clear blue sky?" This is it folks, this is making the Unmanifest Manifest. This is the Virgin Birth.

Are we ripe and ready to conceive a new world? I hope so. It is in this gift that Andrew Harvey points us towards! To make a new world happen, begin with yourself. As Lao Tzu states in the Tao Te Ching, "Be newborn, be free of yourself." Or as Christ said upon watching an infant suckle his mother, "Be like him!"

To listen to our interview of Harvey, visit: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/envision-this/2015/09/14/embody-sacred-love-in-action-the-sacred-activism-of-andrew-harvey

Andrew Harvey's own website is www.andrewharvey.net.

The BBC documentary, The Making of a modern mystic, is at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4gC1tgye1c

Authors Bio:
Burl Hall is a retired counselor who is living in a Senior Citizen Housing apartment. Burl has one book to his credit, titled "Sophia's Web: A Passionate Call to Heal our Wounded Nature." For more information, search the book on Amazon.

Burl's philosophy entails the idea that "everything effects and causes everything thing else." His spirituality of Sophia i.e., Wisdom is universal as well as within each of us. He also sees the idea of Chaos as not being "all over the place" but as infinite relationships.

The question I present in my articles speak not so much towards the politicians, but how WE the people can empower ourselves within a planet that is healthy, wealthy and wise.