A very Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all!  Walking this wonderful and challenging world with friends such as you is among life’s greatest blessings.
 

 FREE COPY OF NO MORE GOODBYES TO FIRST TEN PEOPLE WHO ORDER $20 IN BOOKS FROM http://www.clpearson.com/personal_gifts.htm Take a minute to check your list twice and see who could use a copy of NO MORE GOODBYES: Circling the Wagons around Our Gay Loved Ones, or another personally autographed Carol Lynn Pearson book.  (As always, free NO MORE GOODBYES with purchase of $50; so if you’re among the first ten to order over $50, that means TWO free copies.)

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 2007 has been a year of great satisfaction in seeing so many lives changed because of my play, FACING EAST and the book NO MORE GOODBYES (see www.nomoregoodbyes.com.)   I’ve been thrilled with the hundreds of emails such as this one from a young gay man who, with his Mormon family, came to hear me speak Sunday-before-last at a United Church of Christ service:

“The words that you shared have been replaying in my head this week. After leaving the service I could hardly believe how ‘fired up’ my mom, dad, sister, and our family friend were about discussing the hopeful future of the church and a deep appreciation for the new-found clarity that they all experienced after feeling your precise and powerful message. As I sat there in the car on the ride home, silent in my own reflection, I felt as though I must have been dreaming the words they all spoke. Amazing how far they have come! Thank you, thank you again.”

While good things are happening, there still is such a long way to go.  A few weeks ago in Utah I attended the memorial service of an 18 year old Mormon man who hung himself in his parents’ barn while they were at church.  And not long after that, I received word of another LDS gay suicide in Nevada.  Every one of us must do what we can to change the atmosphere that produces these tragedies.

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 PRIVATE RETREATS!  YOUR PLACE OR MINE!  I recently had a great time with a small group of women in Utah searching for the Divine Feminine.  What subjects in which I specialize would your group like to spend a couple of delicious days investigating? 

See http://www.clpearson.com/CLPRetreatFLYER.pdf   And check out http://heartlanddaughters.com/wake_the_muse for info on a “Creative Women’s Weekend Experience” I’m doing in Iowa in January.

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 STORY: MY TOP-OF-THE-HILL GRAFFITI.  I am deeply blessed in living just a few hundred yards from access to some wonderful Walnut Creek hills.  Almost every morning I climb halfway up to a particular tree on which I sit and gather gratitude for the day.  (Those who would enjoy a glimpse of my tree with me in it, scroll to the bottom of http://www.clpearson.com/CLPRetreatFLYER.pdf .)  Sometimes I climb to the top of the hill, where subtle, magical things often happen.  In the last few months what I call “spiritual graffiti” has been appearing up there, created by my fellow climbers and occasionally me.  During the summer, as I made the climb with a young gay man who had grown up in a polygamous family in Colorado City, we saw a word written in small rocks at the top of the hill: “JOY.”  Next I went up with my friend Rozan and found that “JOY” had been turned into “LOVE.”  Rozan knelt down and turned “LOVE” into “PEACE.”  I next climbed the hill with my brother Warren and his wife Shweta and found that “PEACE” had become “GIVE.”  My brother knelt down and turned “GIVE” into “RECEIVE.”  Next time I was alone; it was an overcast day with fog and smoke from a fire in a nearby county.  My diary tells me: 

            “No sun at all as I hiked.  When I got to the top of the hills I found that there was a new word–‘LIVE.’  As I stood there for a moment to appreciate it, for the first time all morning–and only for about fifteen seconds–the sun came out, spilling light all over the ground.  Live.  Live in the sunlight.  And I shall.” 

            On my next climb, I saw that the little rocks were in disarray, so I arranged them into the word “YES,” then some days later, “HEAL,” then the next week, “THANKS.”  Next my cousin Linda and I found in new and larger rocks, “WE ARE STRONG.”  Then Rozan changed that to “BE STILL.”  And only a few days ago my friend Gary and I ascended the hill to find there a large heart drawn with rocks with a cross inside it. 

            Ah, such a great chat room we have at the top of my hill.  May angels take the messages of our little stones and scatter them across the world!

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 Speaking of beautiful words, this is the season of PEACE.  I leave you with one of my favorite thoughts, appropriate now and forever:

 “If you are wholly free of fear of any kind, and if all those who meet or even think of you share in your perfect peace, then you can be sure that you have learned God’s lesson.”

            --A Course in Miracles

 Peace and love from your friend,                      

 Carol Lynn