The Notre Dame Cathedral has quite a bit of reflection brewing among the collective. From my indigenous friends complaining how funds can easily be employed for a European monument but funds to protect nature and indigenous sacred land remain a debate, to essentially people getting annoyed stating "bigger" issues in the world, everyone appears to be vomiting some sort of issue these days. Nonetheless, it's the purge, a return to look at the way we have viewed each other, ourselves, and a constant return to look at old ways. In the U.S., wikileaks has taught me, most would rather eat-up the roughly six (6) corporate owned propaganda machine and keep their conditioned-ways of perceiving the world, then assess the actual truth. Go vote, while those you vote for slaughter the courageously honest. Give up your guns, with the police armed more than the military (look at Ferguson under Obama) and a Trump CEO-President where conservatives do not understand that running a government like a business is a dictatorship. Couch-potato liberty, so long as there is a boogey man to blame, and a neurologically conditioned sensory hungry human vessel, which has no idea how to harness the sexual-creative force, mass-media images are under the guidance of exactly how to satiate the human vessel, as well as invoke emotions to manipulate the human psyche. The early Romans knew how to use sports, creating the stadium as a way to distract the public from the failings of an empire. Your business men, your marketers, your religious spiritualists, understand Neuro-Linguistic Programming ("NLP") and the Law of Attraction at the occult level. Sheep are easily programmed, that's why some of us prefer the Goat! 

Yes, I'm in the camp that holds Notre Dame Cathedral special to me, as a student of the esoteric studies and overall, some of the most stunning art. My family visited London/Paris back around 2002, where the only main destination that I had chosen on that trip was Notre Dame Cathedral. I made my family walk to see this thing, including some of our more elderly. As like most Gothic Cathedrals specifically designed under esoteric studies, you enter the womb of the Goddess with it's many folds and gorgeous flower above the entrance. But not everyone can enter the domain of the Goddess, so you have Gargoyles protecting the premises, just as Goddess Chamunda has her bhutas. I still have a gargoyle candle holder purchased in Paris protecting my personal altar, so yes, Notre Dame is a bit more for me than a simple visit. It was a stepping stone on my development, and the memory of lighting a candle for the Divine Mother to bless the organization and all of her devotees, parishioners, and children (all that is), feels like a twist in my heart. Yes, it is a dark history, but a mystery that I loved unraveling during the age of Pisces, when one can step outside the egoic-story and see the world as a pretty cool "Game of Thrones" (The Mother of Dragons is a Dragon Herself!). Though I'll proudly admit that I'm more on the "Da Vinci Code" end, I will also suggest that the fire-burn may have been to remove certain esoteric hints. This is an organization that houses one of the largest libraries on the planet, but expects the rest of the planet to bow before one heavily edited book. ​

Given that Catholicism still holds derivative roots in the Roman traditions (Greek-Egypt, etc), where the Jesus story has been catered to follow the dying Solar God (Osiris), a natural phenomena of the Sun dying on Winter Solstice (Saturnalia) and rising again to bloom around Spring. Not all early Christians believed Jesus was crucified, not all early Christians believed Jesus actually existed (was a metaphor), and definitely not all early Christians agreed with the creator gods where the Serpent actually brought the Truth. The Roman empire understood the occult grounds of tapping into the astral realms (Yesod) to effect the material realms (Malkuth). Hence, the use of angels, "ascended" saints, and of course, Mother Mary remained in Catholicism. 

​The derivatives of Catholicism have further removed the feminine aspects, maybe due to occult reasons. As evidenced by John Dee and Queen Elizabeth, the early Anglican Church was not a stranger to occult sciences as well. In actuality, just as it is stupid not to study your business competitors, it is stupid not to study your alleged enemy. Astrology, Alchemy, and other such original sciences were practiced in both the Catholic and Angelican churches, but banned because such tools were used against each other in the push for religious dominance. Hence, demonize such tools for the masses instead of outright forbidding such practices, which would actually creates an attraction emotion, is a tactic to keep such tools in the hands of only the elite. Remember, the Catholic Church did try to control global time and astrological effects by and through the production of the unnatural and unharmonious Gregorian calendar. Some organizations exist to simply create disorder (chaos), such as the Jesuits, in order to move individuals into occult-egregore institutions and/or to push for a global ascension by and through a global "dark night of the soul". Heavens cause stagnation and indigency, Hells push evolution and growth. Creator gods teach form, to further trap you into a form (heaven), while the Destroyer gods teach you to look behind the form to the formless (Apokalpsis; Form depends on the illusion of time and space).  

Nonetheless, the feminine is a necessity for proper occult practices and spiritual development. Above the entry to the astral realms (Yesod) is the ability to harness the will (Hod; Masculine) usually conducted through ceremonial rituals which alter consciousness. Nonetheless, it is the emotional and fluid, the intuitive feeling (Netzach; feminine) which ensouls the the ceremonial rituals (Hod) for such astral workings to manifest on the material plane (Malkuth). Hence, to remove the "feminine" is to remove one's spiritual abilities, paving the way for a hierarchical control systems by and through a religious middle man system. The feminine (Binah), is an aspect of the One consciousness (Kether) as it flows into manifestation (Malkuth), subjugation of such only hinders one's abilities, and ensues patriarchal psychological conditionings embedded in both genders. Each individual holds both nadis as the ida (feminine) and pingala, (masculine), androgynous as Adam-Lilith Kadmon or Ardhanarishvara, where it appears based on the tantras, that one gender archetype tends to take the role of teaching the other gender archetype during differing yugas, as both are balanced until inner completion. In occult-spiritualists practices, such includes sexual-alchemy of using sexual hormones to shift already altered consciousness for actual gnosis-communion with the divine, which can often be mistaken as physical sexual union. Sadly, the closest state to higher gnosis the average individual may experience is that of the sexual orgasm, or the "la petit la mort" where the egoic-story and egoic-persona are "dead" for a momentary glimpse beyond the world of forms. Hence, sex has always been sacred and a means to commune with the divine. Such is found through the early Protestant group, the Moravians, where Jesus' wound from the "spear of destiny" was viewed as a vagina, while the sexually straight male and female adept could all be in courtship with Jesus, rendering many mystical experiences. Mystics such as William Blake were heavily influenced from such traditions. (Schuchard, Marsha Keith, William Blake's Sexual Path to Spiritual Vision.). The Catholic Nun is considered a bride of Christ, is she not?

Constantine's intent, three-hundred (300+) years after the life of Jesus (Essene as called by the Jews, as they were Gentiles) during the times of the Creed of Nicea, is still unclear on whether he was a convert, or strategists who found a way to save the failing Roman empire. Nonetheless, the differentiation between Catholicism and Gnostic teachings/texts is quite clear, where much of Christian colorings have little to do with Jesus, but have been usurped from many other traditions. Such includes the definitions of an afterlife, where Jesus described very little. The Kingdom of Heaven (Kether; Father/Self-Realization) being within you (Tiphareth; Communion with the Holy Gaurdian Angel), where Heaven is described as having "many mansions" feels more like a multi-dimensional consciousness (Astral Realms). In addition, Constantine's vision was of the symbol "Chi Rho" which paved the way for his conversion, which actually looks more like an "x" not the "t"-sign. In fact, it would be much easier to crucify on an "x" as opposed to a "t", where the "t"-cross was another adopted symbol. Why would the Romans inconvenience themselves for a punishment, and how does a body not slide of a cross? Christian education terribly tried answering these questions. Growing up surrounded by religions, I've truly felt like the self-hating Jew in the film The Believer, where fanatical belief systems that lead to oppression will create the Aleister Crowleys and Anton LaVeys in the world. The Roman Church may have been an early attempt to usurp the traditions of two groups they did not care for, the Jewish tradition and Gnostic Christianity, in order to continue the Roman empire. Not something new, as the Romans essentially ripped/merged their tradition from the Greco-Egyptian, and further made themselves blameless as Pontius Pilate washed his bloody hands.   

In truth, the incredible history of Italy is the reason why the early Catholic Church would need to be cut-throat, as Italy was invaded from all directions and still holds an interesting history that should beg any proper historian to look into secret societies. The corporate structure of the Church influenced global economics, but yet certain positions of power breed arrogance, especially when doctrinal rule is done by religious divine right not just as a messenger, but where the leader was to be considered an incarnation of the divine. Hence, the history of the Knights of the Templars (possibly early Freemasons) who broke bread with Muslim mystical hash dealers who taught them about the idea (not the image) of Baphomet. Hash being a conduit to the astral realms (Hod; symbolized by peyote), warriors from cults including the Order of Hashashin (Assassins), Knights Templars, to the secret Roman Mithraic (derived from Persian Avesta; also found in Indian Vedas), all held secret practices where removal of such in the hands of outsiders would be necessary to continue the existence of the Church. In other words, continue to get rid of the heretics as well as any traces of their history and existence, to keep the masses eating up the religious propaganda machine. ​

On the flip-side, the Roman Catholic Church is so much more than simply a political organization seeking tithing, future generations of parishioners (anti-homosexuality), and mass-control as providing religious laws to individuals eating up punitive "blind-faith" belief systems as opposed to understanding the dynamics of karma. Though certain individuals, such as Mother Theresa, held severe racially-ethnocentric and religious superiority programming as evidenced by non-Christian witnesses, where religious threats of hell dictated her conduct, St. Francis of Assisi is well-loved globally as the truth pervaded his being and even influenced the animal kingdom. That same truth, I felt through the Sisters and Padres of my high school. I still remember President Bush (W) bringing us to war, and our celibate Sister Jan holding a picture of an Israeli-Palestine couple deep in a kiss surrounded by war, stating with pride in her face, "isn't this the most beautiful picture you have ever seen". This elderly, exquisitely gentle Sister also stated, "if we are to fight over the Holy Land, then no one should have it, God should take it away from us!". I also remember Sister Pat, though a bit on the "aggressive" end, looking at a picture of Buddhist monks deep in meditation stating, "isn't that beautiful, look at that dedication, same God, different technique".  I have found such to be true in studying St. John of the Cross, who coined the term "dark (k)night of the soul". Again, "same God, different technique". So yes, I do love the Catholic tradition and her many mysteries, as well as my Catholic family. Like Ramakrishna, I find the same gnosis in every religion that I study, including the Left Hand Path. But, there is a difference between politics and spirituality, where much of the world has yet to consciously separate the two to properly discern spiritual truths over elite control mechanisms. 

Hence, such Qabalist understandings define not just major religions, but show that religions are rooted in Indigenous Shamanism. Moreover, the size of a religion which stresses "hell" and "demons" may be adding more issues into the astral realms, which the adept may need to navigate around for proper manifestation in moving down the tree (Malkuth) and for ascension moving up the tree at least to Tiphareth. ​

Jesus himself was one such adept as shown through his time in the Judea desert, being tempted by his own issues further evoked by astral parasitic egregores. By looking for the Kingdom of Heaven within (not with Pharisees and Sadducees), one first achieves communion with one's own holy Self at Tiphareth. Such an adept who has attained communion is considered the Son of God, as such an adept can show you the way and the truth to bring you back home to realizing our true Self at Kether. Finding consciousness outside of material realms of forms, and into the formless, to identity with the space between the atoms as opposed to the atoms themselves, to realize that which perceives through me is the same One that perceives through you, a multifaceted diamond with each individual face brilliantly shining to support the One (Yin/Yang not Light vs. Dark) is what the Qabalists (Pillar of Severity/Mercy), Hermeticists, Tantrics, Vedantics, Gnostics, Sufis, and Taoists taught. 

People that have disclosed such information have been historically persecuted as it goes against religious doctrine aka control mechanisms. I face the same worry, as I still remember the looks, smirks, and comments I got from the patrons of the same Catholic high school post 9-11, something odd given my background, but not odd understanding the psychology of conditioned minds where many in the U.S think India is in Africa. Or, how about when I used to secretly wear (shamefully, intentionally hide) my Shiva pendant at my Protestant elementary, understandable since Shiva is basically a guy holding a trident with a snake around his neck. Well, my beloved Kali-Mahavidya-Sophia has taught me that the word (tongue; Goddess Vak) is mightier than the sword. Should I be seen as Frankenstein's monster, all I can remember is the pain I felt when offering tobacco at the cemetery-smashan in front of the Church of sacred Wounded Knee, remembering Black Elk Speaks, the Ghost Dance, and the words, "Hokahey, Today is a Good Day to Die!". Yes, it is the masculine Osiris that dies. But don't forget that it was through Goddess Isis that we are reborn and we bloom. Just as Shiva suffered the pain of his chopped-up Sati, so I to understand Devi Isis' pain, where Osiris' Phallus is a reminder of the Divine Masculine and of the Crucified Rose. Though, I do not believe it was Set, as the lawyer is typically blamed with the client. 

In relieving my personhood, I do wish everyone a Blessed Ishtar (Ashera for the Semitic traditions; Bhuvan-Aswari for the Tantrik; Inanna, the original dying/resurrecting Goddess) and thank you Soul-Family for helping me speak up, as I am inspirited as you speak and live your truth. We are in this together, externally and internally, for there has never been separation other than what our monkey-mind has told us. I am pushing to love more and more outside of me beyond the internal cocktail dribble of serotonin and dopamine, as I learn to accept, love, and empower what is inside of me, including my shadow self. This memorial piece was an emotional roller-coaster for me as I dig deeper into my own truth. Thank you for reading. ​

I was debating whether to share certain personal information, but judging from my family on facebook, Nipsey got neighborhoods mourning. I remember my elementary-high school days, where my older cousin would take the male cousins cruisin in his convertible 1964 Cadillac, up and down Crenshaw.  Individuals like Nipsey kept that memory alive, kept that legacy alive, and kept those neighborhoods alive. Neighborhoods that every hip-hop head knew in the 90s, now threatened today by colonial-capitalist gentrification. Now family members are rockin "Crenshaw" shirts, and those that live on the block are poetically pouring out their compassion for the future of the district.  

Many who find my blog, as well as many that I follow, carry the banner of "light-worker". It's quite annoying when these folks tell you not to engage "lower frequency" media, and then purport to not throw judgment on it. Try growing up in these neighborhoods, and then you may understand the wisdom that is to be gained from "lower frequency". How is an adept to fully "be" and "connect" with "All That Is", when one doesn't realize the boogey man is still part of the infinite complexities. As a born empath, I truly understand the emotional absorption of being able to feel deeply the same emotions as another, and probably much more. But running away is not what these neighborhoods ​taught me. 

Although I grew up a book-worm nerdy kid, I mimicked my older cousins of not shopping at the regular mall, but buying Dickies at the local swap meet. Simple work pants, where I took pride in my ability to iron creases that impressed my high school friends. I was born and raised somewhere between where Rodney King got beat, and where the culprits who beat were mostly from. I will give you a hint, it's where Ronald Reagan is buried. My relatives are all too familiar with the colorful issues that would present themselves, as some have lived near the Rodney King incident. Another personal incident, when I was around 12 with my cousin 14, we were robbed while eating outside a fast-food joint. One got out the car and talked with my cousin, while I watched the homie in the car looking like he was reaching for something in between throwing me gang signs. Honestly, we just got out the ISKCON ​temple across the street. 

A light worker may complain about guns and death, but I've learned more about respect, trust, loyalty, and actually compassion from the neighborhood, then I have in the business world or even both a Protestant/Catholic education. My employers have robbed me so much more than the boys in the hood have, literally, where my first legal employer still owes me money. As for the neighborhood, let's just say some of us grew up with a rabbit hanging around the relatives, for the love of music of course, as relatives are in the industry. Rabbit's entourage was quite a bundle, where some were so nuts, the older cousins would tell all the younger and female relatives to leave, for everyone's preventative care. 

Rabbit, on the other hand, would spend the day around my cousins rocking a Hawaiian t-shit and cargo shorts. He was family. I remember my eldest cousin looking Rabbit in the eye, and continually telling him, "I think you were an Asian warrior-prince in your past lifetime", with me catching hardcore Rabbit trying to hide his face, while he slightly smiled showing no arrogance. In the evening, Rabbit's crew and my cousins would party, but by day, there would be Indian Saints and Elders (both dot and feather), Indigenous Shamans, and other healers all mingling with the neighborhood. I'm reminded of Rasputin, who allegedly spent his evening with women and opium, but was in Church in front of the Divine Mother deep in prayer by Sunrise. There's also Dr. Oldoinyo Laetoil LeBaaba (Kali Baaba), who had a house in the middle of the hood, where as a child my older cousins put a paint brush in my hand and stated, "paint it black". He, sometimes, would be in the mix with these hoodlums. 

Another personal note, I remember my High School years, being at one of the evening party's. One of my older cousins' friend's, that I had not seen since my elementary years, walked in the room and sat next to me. Man was huge, 6ft+, and looked like he played football. As we sat next to each other, looking each other up and down as I had my feet crossed up on the couch, he says to me "damn, I think your socks smell". Overhearing, Rabbit's cousin perks up and barks, "leave the little brother alone". I'm sitting there thinking to myself, "oh shit ... I'm stuck between these two big ass fools". Again, one is huge and the other, well, Rabbit's entourage. Whereas, my cousins' friend barked louder, "I've known this kid since he was in diapers, he's my little brother, it's my job to tell him". That was a moment for me, looking at these big ass fools who had my back, some of which society would consider scum. Some of my cousins' friends had even told me they would die for me, and I was just a nerdy kid nerding up their lives trying to be cool. Some may even ride, maybe not for me personally, but for my family. Again, the neighborhood taught me respect, trust, loyalty, and compassion. 

So light worker, if you choose to run away from your triggers, know that you're running away from the truth of your own self. My triggers let me know that the shadow work must go on, especially in the blessed City of Angels. Am I triggered by the homie whose got a "pistol grip pump on his lap at all times"? Nope, I get it! The police officer who pulled me and my relatives over for a speeding ticket, who constantly reached for his gun in addressing us, while in a luxury car dressed to visit relatives in Northern California, that I also get. Do understand these neighborhoods, the one's the C.I.A. dropped drugs upon and probably still are given that they got caught by the border patrol (2016), are significantly minority. Do understand that Richard Nixon classified marijuana as a schedule 1 drug to keep Blacks and hippies in prison, despite the Shafer Commission. You may see these neighborhoods as "issues", you may "disengage" from the information they present to you, but I see them as warriors fighting external and internal systematic oppression. As Ice-T expressed, "there can never be justice, on stolen land".  Sure better times may come, but not if we choose to ignore what lurks in the shadows. I can't be a "light" worker out here, which thinks the "dark" is to be opposed.  I need to be a damn "alchemist" as my gratitude pours over the lessons the neighborhoods​ have taught me. 

For those on the spiritual path who are complaining of the "state of the world", I'm reminded of the story of Swami Vivekananda reproaching the Goddess during his last days, for not protecting devotees from Muslim invaders near the altar of Goddess Khir Bhavani (Kali who is fed rice-pudding prasadam). She rebuked him, reminding him that it's just a Divine Play. As energy dances before light to produce mass, so Shakti has her way with Shiva. Who else to bring wisdom to the light, then the Dark Mother.