On a warm December day, Helena felt tentative, as if the city was waiting for something unexpected to happen. This feeling made me nervous. Helena is a barometer. What the environment of Helena expresses is tied to the condition of the world. Many cities are like that, but only Helena was at one time the highest altitude of what is remembered as the Garden of Eden. The tree of life grew here on a ground revealed to only a few living people including me.
If you are asking yourself, “Who am I,” that is the same question I have asked myself most of my life. It took me decades to understand the answer.
As I walked in Downtown Helena, I could hear the murmur of voices asking me that same question. These voices cued me to bring my awareness to the spiritual presence that surrounds the world. That presence is clearer, deeper than the one in which we live. Instead of thinking of it as unclear, out of focus, I have come to know that our world is the unfocused one, the world caught in time. Over the years I have learned to focus myself to be more clearly in the presence of the real world that surrounds ours.
Today, I felt the gathering of the Council that had guided me for over 30 years demanding my attention and my acceptance of its presence. This council was made of individuals who had lived and who had the special work in Heaven of watching over Helena and, through association, me.
As I calmed the distractions around me and looked more deeply into the presence around me, I understood why the world had been waiting. The Creator, the first person of the Trinity, had personally called the meeting. As the real place came into focus, I recognized many of the close individuals who had guided me over the years, stood in formal grace. Usually they appear more as a family gathering with all the noise, argument, teasing, and give and take. Today was different. I realized I was called into a formal agenda.
I stood up straight as I walked down the Gulch. The earlier voices and their question had already revealed that agenda. The Creator, dressed in the colorful, constant activity of creation , asked me the same question, “Who are you?”
Being a theater artist, I recognized I had been rehearsal for this moment all my life. It was one of my best moments when I answered. I answered with humility supported by an honest pride come from conviction and experience.
“I am Ed Noonan, Edge, cast into the Incarnation, beloved of the Holy Family, friend of the Trinity, partner with the one, true God. I am the angel at the tomb, the advocate of the Morning Star. I stand at the side gate. I am the guardian of the valley.”
The response was cheering and laughter accompanied by jostling hug and handshakes. The formality of the moment was replaced by good humor and celebration.
“It is about time,” said the Creator. “You‘ve got work to do.”
The Creator tends to be like that, always getting down to business.
“More work?” I asked. “I just retired.”
That statement was followed by more laughter and the return to the normal active voices of discussion that meant the Council was in full session and everyone had something to say. Catching my breath, I let the voices roll over me. I was able to follow only part of the discussion. My skills to focus were always challenged by distractions of the world in which I walked and lived. Seeing and being in the real world takes a concentration which is hard to sustain. I’ve learned over the years to pick up what I could of the back and forth and to let the rest of the information catch up with me in the time following the vision.
OK, I know what you are thinking. “He’s one of those guys, who thinks he sees visions and who can be caught having discussions with himself.”
You are right and, don’t laugh, it has taken great humility for me to live with myself.
I had to withdraw myself back into the temporal world and keep walking to my car parked on the Gulch. I shook my head because I was obviously going to be busy carrying out Heaven’s schemes. I shook my head and said, “It is easy for all of you dwelling in Heaven, but for the time being, I am stuck here with all my limitations.” Mocking laughter faded around me as I got in the vehicle and turned on the car.