Come welcome the New Year with good food, good company, and good conversation about our visions and hopes for our world as we begin a new circle around the Sun.

Whatever our personal path or story, our lives embody the principles and values we hold most dear. The quiet first day of the New Year is a perfect time to reflect on those principles and what they mean for our journey.

Looking at the world around us, we know ignorance and oppressive power are bringing ever greater harm to people and places. We know a different world is possible, a lighter, more just and compassionate society. In myriad ways, we are working and living that goal into being.

After supper, we’ll  explore Gandhi’s thoughts (influenced by Tolstoy and Thoreau) as he embarked on his path of deep service and social change a century ago, a path he called Satyagraha.

Bring a veg/vegan potluck dish to share and join the conversation.  A small donation is requested to help cover expenses, but all are welcome.

All of us engage in the world in different ways, whether raising children or grandchildren, giving time and energy to activities and groups that reflect our values, engaging in protest or political efforts, or simply trying to stay afloat and patch the holes in our leaky boats. Most of us juggle variations of those tasks every day.

Gandhi developed the term Satyagraha to define and express the principles that shaped his mobilization for social change and personal awakening.  Satya is often translated from Sanskrit as “truth,” or the ultimate ground of all Being. Satya is also sometimes understood to mean “love” or “essence, soul.”  Agraha means to “hold firmly to”, and implies the energy or force of gripping with firmness.  So Satyagraha is a path for living our lives aligned with deep truth, and engaging in action empowered by firm, energetic commitment and resolve in all we do.

Gandhi’s satyagraha is a way of living and upholding our obligations to community and society while continually exploring the spiritual wisdom that finds expression in a non-violent ethic. Gandhi was tirelessly engaged in the social and political upheaval of his time, and simultaneously invested in deep exploration of his spiritual path. In Satyagraha, the principles of non-violent social action challenge us to live vibrant, creative, pragmatic, compassionate lives that reflect timeless spiritual principles brought to life in contemporary conditions.