At the end of the funeral service in The Christian Community, we hear a stern admonition from the spiritual world. We are asked to remember that we are beholden to the spirit in all that we do on earth. A funeral confronts us with the ultimate reality of earthly life; in such a moment, we are particularly receptive for what we can easily forget in the full flow of life: we come from the world of spirit and shall return there. Our time on the earth is only a brief sojourn. Our technological age continually introduces us to new possibilities and new challenges at the threshold of birth and dying. Meeting these consciously in our own lives and those of those we love is a challenge we all face. We hope that this issue will prove helpful in meeting these challenges.<\/p>\n
We are always interested to hear from our readers about their questions and suggestions. Some of these could flow into our choice of themes for forthcoming issues. Perhaps there are areas that we haven\u2019t covered for a long time that could be revisited; maybe there are things that could be deepened. We would be grateful to hear from you about your questions and concerns, which we would take into our thoughts when we plan the issues for the coming year.<\/p>\n
Tom Ravetz<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
At the end of the funeral service in The Christian Community, we hear a stern admonition from the spiritual world. We are asked to remember that we are beholden to the spirit in all that we do on earth. A funeral confronts us with the ultimate reality of earthly life; in such a moment, we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_vp_format_video_url":"","_vp_image_focal_point":[],"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-553","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-issues","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n