Spiritual Growth - Morning Star Institute -- Morning Star Order Holy Warrior

In today’s world, Spiritual Warriorship takes the form of being a champion of the earth and nature, the downtrodden and the oppressed. The Greek Spartans personified the essence of a spiritual warrior. We take heart from the following words of courage and self-sacrifice of the 300 Spartans, saviors of Western Civilization through their heroic action at the “Hot Gates” of Thermopylae:

"Return with your shield or on it" was every Spartan Mother's wartime farewell to her son.

“Go, stranger, and to Lacedaemon tell that here, obeying her behests, we fell.” Memorial inscription to King Leonidas (the Lion), his personal bodyguard of 300 Spartans, the Spartans Helots, and Thespians that all died to a man, forsaking retreat, at the Battle of Thermopylae, August 20, 480 BCE.

Before the beginning of the Battle of Thermopylae, the Persians sent emissaries to bribe the Greeks to give up their arms. Leonidas rejected the offer by saying: "Molon Lave!" ("Come and get them!").

The glorious and fearless action of Leonidas and his three hundred Spartans, against overwhelming numbers and certain death, shines as a beacon of courage and loyalty for all of us who love liberty and freedom, while despising slavery and oppressive tyranny. This wise and noble conduct of the Spartans gives heart to all who strive to overcome adversity and provides a legacy of fearlessness that echoes for an eternity. They lived by the following:

A heart that sees death… but recognizes life
A heart that sees life… but recognizes death

From the Japanese warrior traditions, we discover the philosophy and power of the “Life-Giving Sword” as well as the ancient virtues of the old clan warriors of Japan—the samurai—loyalty to the clan and unflinching bravery: “to face the flying arrows and never turn thy back towards them.” A bravery such as this demands a state of non-attachment to the “I” or the ego of one’s consciousness known as the state of the immovable mind/heart—fudoshin. The “Life-Giving Sword” is eventually transformed into “no sword—a state of no enemy.”

From the mythic past of the West comes the knights of King Arthur’s Order, the Order of the Round Table, questing and adventuring far and wide facing fear, doubt and guilt but always seeking for that most sacred of all objects—the Holy Grail. But only the worthiest of knights can win the Grail and only then the quality that distinguishes this essence of knighthood is the magic of an inward spiritual life; in other words a spiritual warriorship.

Spiritual warriorship for The Morning Star Order of the Archangel Mikael takes the form of combating not only the external wrongs and in-justices of society but all the common enemies of humanity.

These are the internal demons that are the root cause of the wastelands that are our families, communities, organizations and society in general. These demons are our fears, our angers, our doubts and our guilt’s that every day, each one of us deals with either in a positive or negative manner, or bury beneath a layer of amour that keeps us insulated from our loved ones and the world that we live in.

As a holy warrior, or if you will, a holy knight on this worthy quest we can look towards the earth and all of nature to help heal these wastelands. The earth offers us guidance and the opportunity for re-birth. This re-birthing from the great Mother Earth is as a protector of nature and a lover of all of creation. This is expressed as love of self, love of others and a love of the earth.

Being a holy knight means that we do not hide and isolate ourselves but that we face all that life has to give us with a smile on our lips and a song in our heart.

The holy knight is also known as a mystical warrior, a spiritual philosopher that brings oneness to the chaotic separateness of life.

This wise one has been a healer as well as a warrior that has quested through the mountains and the valleys of the earth ever being the spiritual truth-seeker focusing on a life pilgrimage that has embraced the experiential knowledge and mystical wisdom of the unknown and the unity of creation.

This is the evolution of the mystical warrior birthed from the waters of the mother and nurtured by the winds of the father.

^{Spiritual Growth}