In every person we meet there is only One. In every pair of eyes that meet our own, there is the place of purity and of the innocence of soul that is part of the greater Soul to which each belongs. This is true of those we love, and it is also true of those we do not love. For those we do not love are only those whose inner being has not revealed itself to us, covered over as it may have been by hatred or self-hatred, by loss, confusion, or the long-standing practice of having departed from truth.

Nowhere is it more important to understand the nature of sacred relationships than with those we disagree with or with whom we experience a misunderstandin......g or conflict. For the judgment that we make about the character or motives of the 'other' creates separation and does nothing to bring us closer to truth. Judgment fastens labels on people, and the inner being of anyone cannot be encompassed by a label. To know another, we must move past judgment and past labels to experience their inner being, knowing, always, that it is there.

To see others from this perspective is to see the sacred flame within, a flame that in some cases may be submerged beneath layer upon layer of experiences of darkness, yet still remain there beneath the obscurity, for the flame cannot go out. The flame that is hidden by loss of hope, by disillusionment......, by helpless anger, by defiance, pride, rejection, and by the deliberate commitment of the self to purposes that are at variance with the principles of light, is eternal.

When we meet those we would formerly have called 'strangers', or those who seem very different from us in thought, manner, expression, or belief, we must endeavor to step behind the outer manifestation in order to see the sanctity of the One. Without exception, it is there. For there is no being whose inner light does not connect them with the Source. And there is no being who, given a sufficient amount of choosing to reconnect with that light, cannot once again become reunited with that Source.

The world in which there are strangers is rapidly disappearing, and the world in which there are no strangers is arriving. And yet it has not yet made its presence fully known, for in the present world, conflicts still seem unresolvable. In order to heal such conflicts and to take the next step toward resolution, it is necessary that we become innocent again, letting go of the things regarding the 'other' that we feel sure of, and instead, beginning with a clean slate in our desire to see past the outer manifestation of the other to their inner being.

If we meet another with innocence, the reward will be truth. If we meet another with judgment, the reward will either be counter-......judgment or fear and what results from fear. Only innocence allows truth to step forward. Only innocence allows the world to become new, permitting that which was tarnished by false beliefs to drop these beliefs like outworn clothing and to replace them with the new garments of the soul.

For the present, we must look around and see if there are still those with whom we have quarrel because of 'how they are', and seek to repair the separation through arriving at a deeper truth. Innocence and the humility to begin with a clean slate will bring us to the place of knowledge of a deeper kind, knowledge that has been replaced in the past by false opinions that we carried about things.

For this moment in time and for those that follow, we must create an innocent world by becoming innocent ourselves. In this way the sanctity of the One will be invited to show itself behind the faces of each and every person we encounter, for they will discover within themselves the possibility of living as a being of great depth, rather than as the smaller self they thought themselves to be.

May the world bless this movement into innocence, and may the heart of the world bless those who abandon judgment in order to reclaim the earth.

by Julie Redstone http://www.lightomega.org

http://spireality.blogspot.com/2009/08/absence-of-strangers.html