LA Yoga Magazine: November 2009
Twenty-Three Years of Forming Fellowship And Promoting Possibility
The word agape has its origins in the Greek language, in which it means love. One of the meanings of agape in English is love. Not just any kind of love: Unconditional love, compassionate love, brotherly or sisterly love, love of God and even the love God feels for humankind. Love is a powerful force, and it’s one that has the potential to change lives and to keep us on course. Love draws us together, and may even be the secret to the gravitational pull, or to the spinning of the electrons in an atom.
There are times when we can feel a palpable experience of love when we walk into a space, or spend time with a loved one, with family, friends, or even with a group of people we don’t know well or we are meeting for the first time. It may be that experiencing this love is as necessary as our breath for our well-being and our ability to connect and create community. When we take the time to cultivate love, then that love has the potential to shift our perceptions and our world-view.
Walking into the sanctuary of the Agape International Spiritual Center, located in Los Angeles (Culver City, to be precise), feels like walking to a charged environment, electric with love, with vision, with the conditions that allow people to reach their potential and cultivate community and engage in service.
This is no accident. Founder and director Reverend Michael Bernard Beckwith and his wife, musical director Rickie Byars Beckwith see it as a hub of a movement that as Reverend Beckwith says, “takes a stand for love.” Taking that stand is an ongoing process, on that is renewed daily, through vision and fellowship, service and meditation. The power of this practice is explored in the following conversation between Reverend Beckwith and LA YOGA.
Vision Without Action Is A Fantasy And Action Without Vision Is Chaos
Felicia M. Tomasko: You’ve recently suggested that people have “tell a vision” (rather than television) parties to gather people together to talk about their visions. How has the twenty-three years of gathering at Agape International Spiritual Center been a collective tell-a-vision party and how do you see the role of community in creating and sustaining vision?
Reverend Michael Bernard Beckwith: All of the ministries, outreach programs, special projects, and philanthropies of Agape share their genesis in the same Life Visioning Process (LVP) that birthed Agape. In this process which I teach, individuals expand their awareness through meditation and attune themselves to be receptive to visionary ideas from the universal Presence. For twenty-three years, Agape has been a skillful creative medium because people are encouraged to speak and live from vision.
On my PBS special, The Answer Is You, I encourage viewers to regularly turn off the television and instead invite people over to “tell a vision” and cultivate a level of intimacy that supports sharing visions that are trying to emerge in their lives, and to hold one another
accountable to walk in the direction of fulfilling those visions.
FMT: What is the role of community in creating and sustaining visions?
RMBB: Community is very powerful. You see this when you look at many of the indigenous cultures. For instance, there’s a culture in West Africa where when the mother is approximately seven months pregnant she comes to the community and the shaman of the community channels the baby’s energy, names the baby, speaks to the purpose of the baby, and why that baby is taking an incarnation.
I believe all spiritual communities have a similar purpose: to see the highest within one another and become reminders about why we are on the planet, about what our purpose is. Then when an individual comes into a community they can be inspired, reminded about who and what they really are. In this way they can tap into their innate potential and soar. Both the individual and the community benefit.
We live in what I call a high-tech, low-touch society. While it’s very technically advanced, the primary message of our culture is to be a consumer, to make a lot of money, to buy things, to hoard. People have forgotten that they are not here to be consumers; they are here to be creators, artists; they are here to deliver their gifts, talents and skills so that society evolves. You’re not going to get such messages from television unless you are watching public broadcasting or a special documentary.
FMT: In terms of “high-tech and low-touch,” I think there is a tendency for people to feel isolated. What is a way in which people can reach out and find community?
People Have Forgotten That They Are Not Here To Be Consumers; They Are Here To Be Creators, Artists; They Are Here To Deliver Their Gifts, Talents And Skills So That Society Evolves
RMMB: A powerful beginning would be to find a humanitarian cause where a person may give of him or herself and realize they are already part of something larger and that they can contribute from the heart.
There’s a lot of isolation in the world; in our culture often people don’t even know their neighbors. When I was growing up, you knew every person on the block. I think something small that people can do is just one day find out who your neighbors are.
FMT: Service seems to be an antidote to isolation. Sacred service is one of the spiritual practices at the foundation of the Agape International Spiritual Center. How have you incorporated service in your own life and in the congregation over these twenty-three years?
RMBB: One of my favorite statements is, “Vision without action is a fantasy and action without vision is chaos.” When you catch the vision of a world working for the highest and best for all beings with justice and compassion, then it’s natural to want to selflessly serve.
You can’t give unless you believe that you have something to give, whether it’s time, energy, compassion, money, creativity. This attitude increases your sense of plenitude, of having something to give. Selfless service earns merit, what I call “karma credit,” expressed through your spirit of generosity.
FMT: If somebody doesn’t know how to begin that commitment to service what do you suggest as a starting point?
RMBB: If you ask the universe question sincerely, you will receive an insight, guidance and direction and you will be compelled to do something. If an individual sincerely asks, “How can I serve?” they start receiving insights.
FMT: When people find those questions, that inquiry and their service, how do you suggest that people from getting burnt out?
RMBB: That’s a good question. Burnout often comes from doing things for the wrong reasons – your ego gets involved. But when you’re giving from the overflow of a sincere heart, then you’re not giving for the ego’s glorification, where you are just running around, using all of your physical, emotional, and mental resources and so you end up burned out.
FMT: It sounds like service and spiritual inner work are both important.
RMBB: They are two doors that ultimately lead to the same place. The door of service opens your heart and leads you to seek a spiritual practice. The door of spiritual practice expands your awareness of your oneness with all Life and leads you to serve your Self in others.
FMT: The music and arts ministry is celebrating its twenty-first anniversary. How do you feel that this ministry has contributed to community at Agape, and how does your wife Rickie Byars Beckwith anchor its vision?
RMBB: It was twenty-one years ago when Ricky and I wrote our first song together, “I Thank You,” which is a song of thanksgiving. We have written hundreds of songs since then, which have become known around the world as The Sound of Agape.
When I founded Agape, I knew that music was going to be an integral part of the community. Music has a way of softening and opening the heart and allowing people to feel and be inspired by the message. Music helps create the conditions for receptivity and spiritual camaraderie.
I may be a little biased, but Rickie is a musical genius. She has a creative mind and heart; she loves music, she’s interested in it, and she’s a joy-baby. She has the capacity to compose in such a powerful way that speaks to the healing of the human soul. She pulls compositions from her dream state and brings them to the piano, and then I’m privileged to do the work with her. Every month she has new offerings to the beloved community: new chants, new songs, and soon it’s around the nation.
We were just in Calgary and Edmonton and the spiritual communities we visited were singing our songs during their services. We were in Jamaica a number of years ago and people were listening to and singing our music. We feel blessed and humbled that in our lifetime we can travel to other places in the world and hear “I Release, I Let Go,” or “Use Me” or “We Let it Be” or “I Had a Revelation.”
FMT: In closing, what is the most important thing you think a person can do to shift their emphasis from falling prey to the messages of fear and division that are around us to listening to and choosing the messages of divine love and connectivity?
RMBB: Fear, doubt, worry, these are the primary messages we receive from the media and other societal influences within our culture. In my book, Spiritual Liberation, I teach processes for living beyond these limitations and replacing them with confidence in the fundamental goodness of life, with trust in one’s own natural goodness, that we live in a friendly, supportive universe.
We are living in a time where we have to stop looking outside of ourselves and instead ask ourselves, “What am I going to contribute to the upliftment of the world? How can I move in that direction? What must I release from my life and what qualities must I cultivate towards this end? How can I become a beneficial presence in the world and contribute to the creation of an enlightened, compassionate, just society?
In this way we find that little by little our life changes. The next thing you know, we look back over a year of our life and find that we’ve progressed. Old habit patterns of thought and behavior have fallen away and we have grown into our potential. The world becomes
different because we have taken the responsibility to grow and transform, to expand our consciousness.
We have to start somewhere. As I say, “Pain pushes until the vision pulls.” Sometimes people are pushed by pain into a spiritual way of life and sometimes people are pulled by a vision. Ultimately we’re going to be pulled by a mighty vision and let it be a transforming agent in our life so that we can be a transforming agent in the society in which we’re living.
There’s wisdom in contemplating that a time will come when we are no longer living in this three-dimensional world. So the question becomes, “How do I want to spend my life with the time that remains?” May the question lead all of us to respond that we want to be a beneficial presence on the planet.
In addition to his work with Agape, Reverend Michael Bernard Beckwith is the author of a number of books, the most recent of which is Spiritual Liberation.
The month of November is a momentous one for the Agape International Spiritual Community. Friday, November 13, marks the celebration of the twenty-third anniversary of the center and the twenty-first anniversary of the Agape International Choir in a special concert of the Agape International Choir that includes special guest performers and Movement of Agape. Friday, November 13, 8:00 P.M. Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center, 1935 Manhattan Beach Blvd, Redondo Beach, CA 90278. For tickets or more information, visit:agapelive.com.
Beginning on November 27, PBS will begin national airing of the Agape special, The Answer is You. Check local listings or the Agape website for details.
Information on Agape services and ministry schedules can be found on the website. Now, even if you’re not anywhere near Culver City, select services are streaming live on the website every week on Sundays and Wednesdays: agapelive.com.
By Felicia M. Tomasko, RN
Felicia Tomasko has spent more of her life practicing Yoga and Ayurveda than not. She first became introduced to the teachings through the writings of the Transcendentalists, through meditation, and using asana to cross-train for her practice of cross-country running. Between beginning her commitment to Yoga and Ayurveda and today, she earned degrees in environmental biology and anthropology and nursing, and certifications in the practice and teaching of yoga, yoga therapy, and Ayurveda while working in fields including cognitive neuroscience and plant biochemistry. Her commitment to writing is at least as long as her commitment to yoga. Working on everything related to the written word from newspapers to magazines to websites to books, Felicia has been writing and editing professionally since college. In order to feel like a teenager again, Felicia has pulled out her running shoes for regular interval sessions throughout Southern California. Since the very first issue of LA YOGA, Felicia has been part of the team and the growth and development of the Bliss Network.