{"id":82,"date":"2011-03-17T12:39:23","date_gmt":"2011-03-17T12:39:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/insweetcompany\/2011\/03\/from-japan-the-great-mother-turning.html"},"modified":"2011-03-17T12:39:23","modified_gmt":"2011-03-17T12:39:23","slug":"from-japan-the-great-mother-turning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/03\/from-japan-the-great-mother-turning.html","title":{"rendered":"From Japan: The Great Mother Turning"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><i>&#8220;&#8230; God alone loves us unconditionally. Even when we turn away from Him or ignore Him, He silently waits for us.&#8221; <\/i>&#8212; Sri Daya Mata, IN SWEET COMPANY: CONVERSATIONS WITH EXTRAORDINARY WOMEN ABOUT LIVING A SPIRITUAL LIFE<\/p>\n<p>Since the devastation in Japan began, the word on some streets is that Mother Nature is pretty ticked off about the way we&#8217;ve been treating Her. Human beings have a long history of believing that God punishes us for our sins. We anthropomorphize God &#8212; arrogantly believe that our Deity responds to error with the same indignation and judgment we do. Our understanding of the Divine Feminine has historically been tainted by accusations of subversion and witchcraft. When misperception permeates our belief system, we blame what befalls us on an angry, uncaring God.&nbsp; <\/p>\n<p>A friend of a friend of a friend sent me an email from a woman in Sendai that details her experience living in the aftermath of the earthquake. Tremors occur every 15 minutes. Sirens and helicopters are constant, yet she writes of strangers leaving food and water on her doorstep; that there is no looting though people leave their front doors open so they can dash outside in an aftershock. She eats by candlelight; shares stories with others; sleeps in a single room with tens of strangers &#8212; peacefully so. Everyone helps each other in ways they never did before. <\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ve also received emails from organizations I collaborate with expressing their heartfelt sympathy and concern for the Japanese people. I&#8217;ve read a few articles that mention how governments are making noise about reassessing nuclear proliferation. People of all races and religions are turning to the God of their hearts in prayer. Though this is not everyone&#8217;s experience, it&#8217;s quite a different picture that what we see on the news and fear in our hearts<\/p>\n<p>Divine Love is a vast and mysterious thing. It is often through suffering that we come to know how much we are loved and how to really love others. When there is tragedy &#8212; disaster, violence and abuse &#8212; every one of us longs to turn to a loving Someone and feel understood, taken care of, and restored. That we can and do suffer with our Japanese brothers and sisters, that we reach out to them is evidence that the human spirit is evolving to a higher level of consciousness, a deeper understanding of the Divine Feminine, of Her compassion and care in the midst of our deepest sorrows. When we stop blaming God for what happens to us and we turn toward Her we transcend the pain and suffering that is part of this world. <\/p>\n<p>Your thoughts?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;&#8230; God alone loves us unconditionally. Even when we turn away from Him or ignore Him, He silently waits for us.&#8221; &#8212; Sri Daya Mata, IN SWEET COMPANY: CONVERSATIONS WITH EXTRAORDINARY WOMEN ABOUT LIVING A SPIRITUAL LIFE Since the devastation in Japan began, the word on some streets is that Mother Nature is pretty ticked&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":231,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-82","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-interconnectedness","category-the-divine-feminine"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>From Japan: The Great Mother Turning - In Sweet Company<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/03\/from-japan-the-great-mother-turning.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"From Japan: The Great Mother Turning - In Sweet Company\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"&#8220;&#8230; God alone loves us unconditionally. Even when we turn away from Him or ignore Him, He silently waits for us.&#8221; &#8212; Sri Daya Mata, IN SWEET COMPANY: CONVERSATIONS WITH EXTRAORDINARY WOMEN ABOUT LIVING A SPIRITUAL LIFE Since the devastation in Japan began, the word on some streets is that Mother Nature is pretty ticked&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/03\/from-japan-the-great-mother-turning.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"In Sweet Company\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-03-17T12:39:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Margaret Wolff\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"From Japan: The Great Mother Turning - In Sweet Company","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/03\/from-japan-the-great-mother-turning.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"From Japan: The Great Mother Turning - In Sweet Company","og_description":"&#8220;&#8230; God alone loves us unconditionally. Even when we turn away from Him or ignore Him, He silently waits for us.&#8221; &#8212; Sri Daya Mata, IN SWEET COMPANY: CONVERSATIONS WITH EXTRAORDINARY WOMEN ABOUT LIVING A SPIRITUAL LIFE Since the devastation in Japan began, the word on some streets is that Mother Nature is pretty ticked&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/03\/from-japan-the-great-mother-turning.html","og_site_name":"In Sweet Company","article_published_time":"2011-03-17T12:39:23+00:00","author":"Margaret Wolff","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/03\/from-japan-the-great-mother-turning.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/03\/from-japan-the-great-mother-turning.html","name":"From Japan: The Great Mother Turning - In Sweet Company","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/#website"},"datePublished":"2011-03-17T12:39:23+00:00","dateModified":"2011-03-17T12:39:23+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/#\/schema\/person\/9e1d77d12de19dd0d4fbc84d1f7fc52a"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/03\/from-japan-the-great-mother-turning.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/03\/from-japan-the-great-mother-turning.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/03\/from-japan-the-great-mother-turning.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"From Japan: The Great Mother Turning"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/","name":"In Sweet Company","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Margaret Wolff","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/#\/schema\/person\/9e1d77d12de19dd0d4fbc84d1f7fc52a","name":"Margaret Wolff","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/673\/67331f0571f27a0987e8cbfde3e832b4x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/673\/67331f0571f27a0987e8cbfde3e832b4x96.jpg","caption":"Margaret Wolff"},"description":"Margaret Wolff has a gift of luring people into becoming who they really are. She speaks and writes about things women care about: how to make our lives and our work be about what we value most; how to navigate challenge and change; how to live with integrity and grace, to look at error in ourselves and others in a forgiving way and view life as an invitation to transform ourselves into instruments for the Greater Good. \"I laughed, I cried, I was silent, I cheered. Most of all, I loved.\" Spoken by a woman at In Sweet Company Retreat, these words express what women experience when Margaret engages them in dynamic, soul-searching conversations about their lives. Margaret holds degrees in art therapy, psychosynthesis, and leadership and human behavior. Her work takes her to universities, to conferences and retreat settings, to living rooms and board rooms -- wherever women gather. Her articles, essays, and stories are featured in numerous magazines; her women\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s spirituality retreats are held throughout the U.S. Margaret\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s last book, In \"Sweet Company: Conversations With Extraordinary Women About Living a Spiritual Life\" (Jossey Bass), is a collection of intimate conversations she had with 14 famous women of various ages, faiths, and backgrounds about how their spirituality nourishes them and serves as a steady compass for their decision-making. Olympia Dukakis, Riane Eisler, Zainab Salbi, Margaret Wheatley, Sri Daya Mata, Lauren Artress, and other women artists, activists, religious leaders, and visionary thinkers shared their lives with her. You can too!","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/author\/mwolff"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/231"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}