The Anne Report brings you up to date on Anne’s latest activities. The Main Article, God Is Dead, describes how Anne’s childhood understanding of God changed as she matured. Today’s Anne Talk is Listen to Intuition Teleseminar with Anne Sermons Gillis. In this teleseminar, presented on March 28, 2012, Anne provides great tips for enhancing our intuition. Click to see Anne’s Art. Today’s Dr. Money Talk is Arigato Your Money. Watch this video to learn the best way to have a good relationship with money. Click to see the Quotes, Quips, & Thoughts. The Featured Product This Month highlights Anne’s Five Books and includes a reduced price when purchasing All Five Books. Click to learn about EZosophy. Click to learn about Anne’s Abundance Affirmations. Click for Shareables From Anne. Click to learn about Anne’s Schedule. Click to Schedule Anne. Click to learn about Anne’s Services.

Living EZosophy, December 7, 2021
Published Weekly on Tuesday Mornings

In This Issue

Phone: 713.922.0242
Email: anne@annegillis.com

Anne’s Websites

  The Anne Report

The Anne Report

Dear ,

It’s hard to believe that there are tigers, zebras, and camels within ten miles of our home. Saturday we took our grandchildren to Bee City Zoo. The boys’ favorite part was the aviary. The parakeet-filled enclosure is fun, if you like parakeets landing on you and tickling your head and arms. They loved it. One might have as many as ten parakeets land on them at the same time. There was a reptile house with an in-house naturalist who answered questions about the pets. I learned a lot about alligators. They were on the endangered species list until 1987. Thomas and Reynolds each held a python and an alligator. I admit, holding a snake was not appealing to me.

   
 Thomas with Bird           Reynolds with Alligator
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Dinner conversation one. Thomas: “I am of the Thomas species. Everyone named Thomas is in the Thomas species. Reynolds is of the Reynolds species. The people in each species are a lot alike.” As a good grandmother would do, I just listened and bobbed my head up and down.

Dinner time conversation two. Thomas: “Why do we have bad words.” Me: “People get mad, and they want to express their bad emotions.” Thomas: “I know a bad word.” “What is it?” Thomas: “I don’t want to say it out loud and have Reynolds hear it. I’ll whisper it to you.” He whispers. It takes me three times to understand what he’s saying. “Britches,” he says. “Britches?” I repeat. He looks like a deer in the head lights. I had said it out loud! “That’s not a bad word.” “It’s not.” “No,” I reply. I think I can guess what word he was thinking of; he had misremembered the word or heard it incorrectly. I didn’t go there!

I had a tea for three friends at our home on Thursday. I used the good sliver and my old-fashioned teacups, the ones with saucers. I brought out my grandmother’s small, cloth, tea napkins, and made three yummy treats. The ladies, all from the north or mid-west, made a fuss over the event, though each had a tiny bit of curiosity etched on their faces that said, “Who entertains like this for a small afternoon get together?” I looked at them and answered the unspoken question. “I majored in Home Economics the first three years in college, and I’m from the South.” They understood.

It’s the time of year we can all make life EZ or at least EZier. Let’s all make it an EZosophy holiday. Be sure to check out the Conscious Christmas Carols pdf download for this season. And that’s it for the Anne Report.

Reminder: The last weekly newsletter issue will be December 21, 2021. It’s the tenth anniversary issue. That means there are only two more weekly issues to go, after this issue. Future newsletters will be sent occasionally.

  Main Article

God Is Dead

I loved my church when I was growing up. It provided a framework for living. The church’s liberal theology did not cram anything down my throat. Our youth, from the tiny ones to adolescents, gathered each Sunday and belted out the musical version of “The Earth is the Lord’s,” which is the 24th Psalm, put to music. There were other songs, but that one was my favorite. It was steady and stalwart, and I felt like an important soldier marching into glory when we sang. We were accompanied by a live musician, and the piano chords were majestic, soul stirring. I was at church when the doors opened, in wide-eyed wonder of the predictability and the security I felt within its walls.

When I was 17, my certainty, my safe, emotional respite, fell apart. My Sunday school teacher, my favorite one of all times, told us that if our idea of God was a white man with a beard, who sat in heaven and doled out judgments, that we had better think again. I was shocked when I realized that my God was a Santa Clause god. I had a dream of a Santa Clause lying over a grand piano. The Santa Suit was empty and only the head with a white beard remained. My god was dead.

As a girl, I had been as good as I could be, given this was a time of raging hormones, and it was the 60’s, but now, my reason for being good deflated. I had tried to please God so that I could either get favors, or, at the least, avoid punishment. That seemed reasonable, given that the 24th Psalm insinuated that goodness was rewarded. “Who may ascend the mountain of the Lord? Who may stand in his holy place? The one who has clean hands and a pure heart….”
There I was, at 17 years old, trying to hammer out a system of ethics that was not based on punishment and reward. This personal system of morality was slow in coming, but along the way I discovered goodness was not really something demanded by God. I realized that God was a benevolent something, something undefinable, and goodness and mercy were human characteristics. If I am not good to myself or others, I suffer; they suffer. Goodness is not about being holy; it is about providing myself with spiritual nourishment. Goodness and kindness are practical suggestions.

I was resolute in redefining God. I heard people talking about God smiting this, doing God’s will, and a God demanding sacrifice. “Geeze, I wouldn’t do that. I need a God that is at least as nice as I am. Why bother dealing with a grinch?”

I discovered that people often misinterpreted the scriptures. During the time the Bible was written, the idea of literal truth was unknown. People might speak of time, and they would say, “Time is a river.” They did not mean that time was a river. They knew that rivers flow, and, like a river, time flows. They spoke in metaphors and analogies. No one took anything literally. Literalism was not yet developed. When I see a sign that says, Bible based church, I admit, I feel queasy. People are basing their lives on principles that are not aligned with the scripture’s original intentions. But who am I to judge?

Moving away from the religious basics of our culture, though they may be erroneous, takes courage. It’s like free falling. Without dogma and concepts to break our fall and provide a false sense of safety, there arise many dark nights of the soul. I have taken many walks in that dark, but, as time passed, I lost much of my fear of the dark.

Where did this leave me—all this journeying, questioning, falling, and getting back up again? You might say I landed in the land of Anne. Remember this? “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and all else will be added to you.” It’s true, but the God I sought was not a man, not even a person; it was a force that runs the Universe. It is a place, a space, and a force filled with unconditional love and goodness. And then there was another hint: “the kingdom of heaven is within.” And, lo and behold, that’s where I found it. MLK said, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.” There is a moral Universe and it lives in me; it advises me, it is me, and it points me toward the same innocence and wonder of that five-year-old. I’ve come full circle. The things I learned as a child had great wisdom, but my literal mind could not distinguish the letter of the law, which is misunderstood by too many, from the spirit of the law.

Yes, the earth is the Lord’s, but the word lord was misinterpreted as well. The original word for God, Lord, is a verb, not a noun. God is that moving, dynamic force of creation that informs and inspires us at every level. It lives in us, as us, and, though I may never understand the mystery that is our true nature, I must say that since Santa Clause died, my life’s been much EZier.

  Quotes, Quips, & Thoughts

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  Featured Product This Month

Anne’s Five Books
(15% Off & Free Shipping for All 5 Books)



The Living Book  -  Words Make a Difference
Standing In The Dark  -  EZosophy
Offbeat Prayers for the Modern Mystic

Click here to learn more about Anne’s 5 books.

Click Here To Get All Five Books
at 15% Off the Regular Price,
Plus Free Shipping!

  What is EZosophy?

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  Anne Talk

Listen to Intuition Teleseminar with Anne Sermons Gillis

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Today’s Anne Talk is Listen to Intuition Teleseminar with Anne Sermons Gillis. In this teleseminar, presented on March 28, 2012, Anne provides great tips for enhancing our intuition. 43:07

You can join Anne’s EZosophy team by watching her EZosophy channel.

  Anne’s Art

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  Dr. Money Talk

Arigato Your Money

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Today’s Dr. Money Talk is Arigato Your Money. Watch this video to learn the best way to have a good relationship with money. 2:39

You can join the Prosperity Team by watching Anne’s Dr. Money channel.

  Abundance Affirmations

Join Dr. Money’s Facebook Group

This group is a place to post uplifting affirmations and thoughts about prosperity and abundant living. Let’s create a right relationship with money so that we feel comfortable about money. Let’s use money as it’s meant to be used, and not as a way to accumulate power or to fill a void. We don’t need money to buy more stuff. We need it to create a world that works for everyone. We want to cast off old beliefs of lack and reclaim our natural state of abundance. Anne, AKA Dr. Money, posts a nightly goodnight video for the prosperity team, and everyone who watches those videos becomes a part of the prosperity team.

  Shareables From Anne

Download and Share these links.

The World’s Best Weight Loss Secret

Thought Freedom

40 Days to Abundance

The EZosophy Vows

Vows of Seriousness

Anne’s Conscious Christmas Carols

  Anne’s Schedule

Fri., Feb. 4, 2022, 7:00-9:00 PM EST
Detroit Theosophical Society Meeting.
https://www.tsdetroit.org
Topic: Intuition: The Bridge Between Mind and Spirit, with Anne Sermons Gillis.

To join by phone, find your local number: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kdSYCz6dMB.

Meeting ID: 821 1657 0441, Passcode: 518265

Wed., Mar. 2, 2022, 8:00-9:00 PM EST
Milwaukee Theosophical Society’s Zoom Meeting. Details to come. https://milwaukee.theosophical.org

  Schedule Anne

Call or Email Anne Now to Schedule Her for Your Virtual Meeting.

You may reach Anne by phone at 713.922.0242. Anne is now in South Carolina, on Eastern Time, so please factor in that time zone when calling her. Click here to email Anne. Anne is also available to officiate at weddings and funerals.

Contact Anne to book your event:
713.922.0242 or anne@annegillis.com.

  Anne’s Services

Need a Coach or a Rent-a-Friend?

Interested in getting ongoing support? Try life coaching with Anne. Anne offers both short-term and long-term coaching. Contact her for details. Click here to contact Anne by email or Click here to view information on Anne’s One Year Seminar and other training too.

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