Picture: Reverend Jill & Greg in the new Temple Home
Today we have celebrated a House Blessing for Jill and Greg. The blessing took me back in time to when the seed of a thought to do House Blessings first came to mind. It was in 1999 at Anandashram when I was invited to the room of a couple who worked in the Ashram and were moving into their new quarters. Swami Satchidananda was the honored guest, incense was lit and the group rang out with Ram Nam for some time, then Prasad (blessed food) was served to all participants.
I thought, “How wonderful to start out your new home with blessings of enlightened souls and the sacred chanting of Ram Nam.” In India the center of daily spiritual life is not the temple, but is right in the home. Devotees set aside a room, if they have the space, or a part of a room for puja, a dedicated space for devotion to God. Temples are generally used for special occasions and as pilgrimage spots, but regular worship of God occurs in the home. This spiritual center becomes the nexus of blessings for the entire family and community through devotees God contact. Where better to strive for realization than in your own home?
To dedicate the home to being a Temple-home is the intention behind the House Blessing. A spiritual atmosphere is built with chanting, prayer and meditation by all who attend. This jumpstarts the higher vibration that is then continued by the regular practice by the house inmates. The spiritual atmosphere seeps into all activities of the home, both sacred and mundane. The power of Divine Consciousness is a blessing to the household, the community, and, if we would but know it, an unlimited potential for how far those uplifting vibrations can radiate from sincere practitioners.
This all-in-one package of the Temple-home supports the family in so many ways. When purity pervades the atmosphere of a home a natural filter is created that makes bad behavior feel doubly inappropriate, it just feels out of place. On the other hand, spiritual power makes doing what is right and uplifting natural. This power also extends itself to the community in which the Temple-home resides, thus benefiting so many with or without their awareness. In an intentional experiment a meditation group meeting once a week saw a significant reduction of crime according to police statistics in a rough part of town after they began their weekly, one hour meditation.
It truly is a great thing when you dedicate a space to your practice. It may be a room, a corner of a room or a closet space you claim. Your practice builds a power in that space, just as it does in the things you use, such as your meditation blanket, beads and altar. On one of those days you feel drained or uninspired, the vibration you have invested into your meditation space will lift you up and support you—helping to transform a tough day into a good one.
Gradually the walls, floors, everything in your room and home resonates with that higher vibration and others who enter your home will feel it as well. Even those who are not attuned to spiritual practice will comment that your home feels peaceful, or they just feel good when they enter in; in some notable ways they will recognize there is something differently salubrious about your home.
You start by feeling peace and upliftment, making God contact during your practice. Then you can consciously radiate that experience out to your home, community, the world and creation itself. In feeling the vibrancy in the room, your room then becomes transparent and the power you feel goes out and out as your consciousness expands with this feeling. God Himself is working through you to bless this world. There is nothing greater in this world than to be a conscious instrument in the hands of the Divine. You and all those sincere in their spiritual practice invisibly unite to lift this world up for much needed harmony, peace, light and love. In this way your Temple-home becomes a blessing for one and for all.