Empowered Places and Things > Sacramental Worship and Holy Sites

"Find Me Always Present":
The Development of Sacramental Worship
and Holy Sites in Adidam


Carolyn Lee

From The Promised God-Man Is Here, by Carolyn Lee, Ph.D. (1998 edition).

Starting in 1978, Avatar Adi Da introduced His devotees to the realm of sacramental worship as a means to enter into Communion with Him whether He was physically present or not. Early that year, during a period in Hawaii in which He was in the company of only a few of His devotees, Avatar Adi Da sent back this message to the larger gathering of devotees:


Bring your body-minds to Me, as I bring My human body-mind to you. Then you will be Granted the Revelation and the Realization of My All-Pervading Divine Body of Grace, and you will Find Me always Present under the conditions of all experience and in the company of all beings. Then, even when you are not in My physical Company, you will worship Me and surrender to Me, and I will always be tangibly Present. At last, you will be Drawn into Deepest Heart-Intimacy with Me, Most Perfect Identification with Me, and Divine Realization of Me, Prior to all "difference". Then you will Abide in Me forever — whether or not the worlds of experience arise to your notice.

Avatar Adi Da Samraj


When He returned to the Mountain Of Attention, Avatar Adi Da began to instruct a few devotees in puja, the ancient practice of invoking the Divine by actively worshipping and anointing images of the Deity, using natural elements such as water, oil, and ash. The principal object of esoteric worship, He explained, is the Spiritual Master’s human Form, the body of the Guru. Because the Guru has Realized God, he or she reveals the Divine and grants the Divine Blessing in a uniquely potent way.

Avatar Adi Da communicated the esoteric fullness of puja on the Guru’s Form one evening at Bright Behind Me, which was then His residence at the Mountain Of Attention. He sat motionless in a room in the house, while devotees waved flaming lamps in large circles around His body, accompanied by an ecstatic explosion of drums, rattles, cymbals, and tambourines. Outside, on the porch, there were more devotees — circumambulating the house, chanting, and beholding the Form of their Beloved Guru through the windows. Light and sound and movement swirled around Avatar Adi Da while He sat Silent and Radiant, His Divine Love-Bliss enveloping everyone.

That night, Avatar Adi Da established the ceremonial worship of His Divine Form, in the lives of His devotees. And, thereafter, bodily-expressed devotion, worship, and praise of Avatar Adi Da as the Living Divine Person became a part of devotees’ daily lives. Regardless of the location of His human Body — and even after His physical passing — this Puja can always be done, using a photographic (or otherwise artistically rendered) representation of Avatar Adi Da.

Part of Avatar Adi Da’s Work to establish this process of acculturation to the sacred and right Spiritual relationship to Him was His establishment of particular places at the Mountain Of Attention Sanctuary as holy sites, specifically Empowered by Him. He indicated to His devotees that these special places should become temples, places in which to associate ecstatically with His Spiritual Presence. And He explained that, by devotees rightly serving these places of Power and constantly Invoking Him there, His Blessing of all beings would be magnified.


 

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Quotations from and/or photographs of Avatar Adi Da Samraj used by permission of the copyright owner:
© Copyrighted materials used with the permission of The Avataric Samrajya of Adidam Pty Ltd, as trustee for The Avataric Samrajya of Adidam. All rights reserved. None of these materials may be disseminated or otherwise used for any non-personal purpose without the prior agreement of the copyright owner. ADIDAM is a trademark of The Avataric Samrajya of Adidam Pty Ltd, as Trustee for the Avataric Samrajya of Adidam.

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