Communicating Anthroposophy
Rudolf Steiner College A Center for Transformative Education, the Arts,
Actual/Potential, Youth/Age
and Waldorf Teacher Education
Last January, when the national council was meeting with friends and members in East Troy, Wisconsin, my intermittent work with the ideas of Owen Barfield and Samuel Taylor Coleridge focused into one persistent thought. Anthroposophy connects human and cosmic spirit, and Coleridge seeks a similar connection in considering how the ultimate potentiality or power to become —what we perhaps ought to mean by the word “spirit”—enters into actual manifestation. To express its whole character, potentiality must stretch itself into a “polarity of contraries,” a pair of linked qualities in which one side increases only at the other’s expense. (Barfield’s great example is the polarity in language between exact communication and unique self-expression. The more you get of one, the less you have of the other. Pushed to either extreme, meaning itself disappears from the communication.) Coleridge discerned that the cosmic creative gesture must unfold between limitless expansion and a pulling back into the minimum. On that bitter cold night in Wisconsin it struck me that Rudolf Steiner’s anthroposophy reaches out with the same gestures. On the one side it stretches and leads us out, to the beginning of time and to futures beyond imagination. On the other side it enters into particulars of our individual situation, right into the intimate space of free conscience in the human heart. In this issue of Evolving News for Members & Friends polarities are at work as we listen in to the wonderful, multi-layered renewal of youth participation in the anthroposophical movement. On the next page Nathaniel Williams gives a wise and gentle account of the youth movement in Steiner’s time. Then Maika Munske shares the stark transcendent vision of the newly arrived young adult. And Caitlin Balmer speaks about the impulse of the recent Connect Conference at the Goetheanum, for Waldorf senior classes. In each account I hear, at different pitches, the isolation of individuality reaching to affirm that community—alongside self-development—is our avenue for regaining our higher identity. Youth’s seeking challenges elders’ absorption into the fixity and exclusions of material existence, into the culture of death. And age notes youth’s uncertainties and inexperience and hesitant compassion. Meanwhile, some youth carry the sobriety of a staggering cosmic old age. And some very old persons reveal on this earth the enduring youthfulness of real freedom won. Into these contrasts and disparities anthroposophy can bring understanding, good will, peace—if we open ourselves to the possibility. Whether we are reaching out beyond our comfort level to meet needs, or drawing back into the immense solitude of meditation, the work that Rudolf Steiner has led us into can accompany us. In life’s polarities anthroposophy reveals meaning and purpose that steadily become intelligible, a great fabric of conscious human being, woven by love. In subsequent articles the theme of youth becomes hidden, but we can discern its spirit of renewal grappling with the isolation of farm life, with an old anthroposophical community’s need for social transition, with the general economic and ecological crises. And then, from young-old Herbert Witzenmann to the newest eurythmists going out into the world, the timeless speaks again into our mortal situations, and blesses them.
NOW ENROLLING At Rudolf Steiner College, you can join fellow students and an exceptional faculty in programs that prepare you to transform yourself and the world. Full-time residential and part-time programs available. Visit our campus in Fair Oaks, CA. Programs, conferences and workshops are also offered in San Francisco and other locations. Foundation Studies and Waldorf Teacher Education Early Childhood, Grades and High School (summer) beginning September 2009 in Fair Oaks, CA Photos by Jim Heath
San Francisco Waldorf Teacher Education Early Childhood, Grades and High School options available Weekend & Summer beginning September 2009
PROGRAMS IN • Consciousness Studies • Compassionate Community Facilitator Training • Early Childhood Education In-Service Program • Eurythmy • Lifeways Childcare Provider Training • Remedial Education Program • Biodynamics • Community Learning Centers for Foundation Studies in your location Financial aid available for qualified applicants.
Rudolf Steiner College 9200 Fair Oaks Blvd., Fair Oaks, CA 95628 916.961.8727 www.steinercollege.edu * rsc@steinercollege.edu bookstore@steinercollege.edu * housing@steinercollege.edu Visit our NEW Online Bookstore
— John Beck, Editor Spring-Summer 2009
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