Jediism & Journal of Jedi Richard Strange

I am pleased to announce that Jedi Dennis William Dolino has been released from prison in Saudi Arabia, and he is back home in the Philippines with his family :). I’m assuming Mr Lactaotao was also released, but Jedi Dolino didn’t mention this at this time.

Thanks go to Jedi Setanaoko, Jedi SlabTzu DelFuego, and Jedi Punven for helping with this mission to have Jedi William be released on time.

As we have found out, people in prison in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia are often forgotten about, or worse, and so I would also like to extend my thanks to those in diplomatic circles, whom I contacted or whom were involved in relation to this mission, for facilitating this release. 

 I hope that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will now go on to improve things in regards to their judicial system, and treatment of prisoners. In a system where justice is swift, then compassion should also be just as swift.

 May the Force be with You

 Jedi Richard Strange

The following post I received from the AndorProjex email list gives warning that the current forecast of the rise in sea level (by just a a meter or so) could be dangerous, especially to those in charge of bolstering coastal and river flood defences. With the way the arctic ice is melting - the arctic could be more or less ice free in another decade, and not 2050, or 2100, as thought just a year or 2 ago - then surely Greenlands vast sheets of ice could begin to melt just as fast.

I feel that they’d better add another 7 meters to that first estimate of 1.5 meters or so, for the global rise in sea levels.  This may happen in our lifetimes.

 May the Force be with Us

 Jedi Richard Strange

Sun Feb 14, 1:12 pm ET

PARIS (AFP) – Greenland’s continent-sized icesheet is being significantly eroded by winds and currents that drive warmer water into fjords, where it carves out the base of coastal glaciers, according to studies released Sunday.

The icy mass sitting atop Greenland holds enough water to boost global sea levels by seven metres (23 feet), potentially drowning low-lying coastal cities and deltas around the world.

At present, the ocean watermark is rising at around three millimetres (0.12 inches) per year, a figure that compares with 1.8mm (0.07 inches) annually in the early 1960s.

But Greenland’s contribution has more than doubled in the past decade, and scientists suspect climate change is largely to blame, although exactly how this is occurring is fiercely debated.

Some theories point to air temperatures, which are rising faster in far northern latitudes than the global average.

A rival idea is that shifting currents and subtropical ocean waters moving north are eroding the foundation of coastal glaciers, accelerating their slide into the sea, especially those inside Greenland’s many fjords.

Until now, however, these studies have been mainly based on mathematical models rather than observation.

A team of scientists led by Fiammetta Straneo of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts set out to help fill that data void.

Working off of a ship in July and September 2008, the researchers took detailed measurements of the water properties in the Sermilik Fjord connecting Helheim Glacier in eastern Greenland with the ocean.

They found deep water streaming into the fjord was 3.0-4.0 degrees Celsius (37.4-39.2 degrees Fahrenheit), warm enough to cut into the base of the glaciers and hasten their plunge into the sea.

Moored instruments left in the fjord for eight months showed that winds aligned with the coastline played a crucial role in the influx of these warmer waters.

“Our findings support increased submarine melting as a trigger for the glacier acceleration, but indicated a combination of atmospheric and oceanic changes as the likely driver,” the researchers say.

In a separate field study, Eric Rignot of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California and colleagues tried to calculate the relative share of the causes of glacier loss.

Investigating the western side of Greenland, they took ocean measurements in August 2008 in three fjords at the base of four glaciers breaking off into the sea, a process known as calving.

Ocean melting, they found, accounted for between 20 and 75 percent of ice loss from the glacier face, with calving from the part of the iceberg exposed to air accounting for the rest.

Meanwhile, a study also published in the journal Nature Geoscience warned that oceans could become more acidic faster than at any time over the last 65 million years.

Andy Ridgwell and Daniella Schmidt of the University of Bristol, western England compared past and future changes in ocean acidity using computer simulations.

They found that the surface of the ocean is set to acidify even faster than it did during a well-documented episode of greenhouse warming 55.5 million years ago.

Accelerating acidification has already begun to take a toll on numerous marine animals that play a vital role in ocean food chain and help draw off huge quantities of CO2 from the atmosphere.

The calcium carapace of microscopic animals called foraminifera living in the Southern Ocean, for example, have fallen in weight by a third.

I’ve been a member of the AndorProjex email list since October 2009, and I have come to find that it is an environmental think tank par excellence. If you’re interested in the environment to any degree, then you may be staggered by what these guys know between them.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/andorprojex/

If you’re interested in setting up your own eco ark or celss (Closed/Controlled Ecological Life Support Systems), to live sustainably within, then this is the place to begin. In fact, one of the founding members, I believe, and a jedi friend of mine, Jedi Jade, knows most, if not all, of the players involved in the Biosphere 2 experiment involving celss, and has learned from their mistakes, whilst living in his own eco ark.

May the Force be with You

 Jedi Richard Strange

I received the following bit of news further below, from the AndorProjex Email List, which has put China back in the fight to save the environment - which has got to be good news. Despite the political posturings at Copenhagen, China seems to have committed itself to a greener future, and I hope that they will continue through with this effort. I also wish that they would come out from behind their walls at long last and join the rest of the world with open hearts and minds.

May the Force Guide Them

Jedi Richard Strange

Sat Dec 26, 11:59 am ET

BEIJING (AFP) – China’s national assembly Saturday signaled the country’s commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions by adopting a law supporting its renewable energy industry.

The new law, an amendment to one on renewable energy adopted by the National People’s Congress standing committee, obliges electricity grid companies to buy all the power produced by renewable sources.

It also empowers the State Council’s energy department, the electricity regulatory agency and its finance departments to determine the amount of renewable energy available in the country’s overall power generating capacity.

Power companies will be obliged to take up all of that capacity, and those refusing to do so will be fined an amount up to double that of the economic loss of the renewable energy company, Ni Yuefeng, vice-president of the assembly’s environmental affairs commission, told reporters.

The law was adopted after China was criticised for obstructing the adoption of a treaty on climate change during last week’s international summit in Copenhagen.

The new law in fact showed China’s commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, Ni said.

“The new law will help China reduce its emission of greenhouse gases in a voluntary manner,” Ni told a briefing.

Despite China’s reluctance to climb on board the eco salvation wagon the whole world needs to be on to save civilization and life as we know it, we must all move forwards into the new year and the future positively.

The Jedi are growing together at the Jedi Enclave of Coelescere, and I hope for this to continue in the new year, so that we may make a difference - we will need to be strong for this, and I feel we will grow strong as we attract more light side jedi in to our ranks. I have been honoured already with a place on the Council, and I feel at home. I have shared christmas greetings with Jedi Dolino from his prison cell in Saudi Arabia (he really shouldn’t be there), and hope that the government’s I have communicated with about his predicament will help him be released on time. In any case I have not left him alone, and his faith is unshaken - in fact he has taken up the peacekeeping role of the jedi whilst incarcerated. I have helped as much as I can so far, but won’t stop until he his released to the world, where a nurse, and an agent of light should be.

 In any case, and whatever faith, way or religion you follow I wish you a happy holidays and a happy, peaceful and prosperous 2010!

 May the Force be with You

Jedi Richard Strange

My friend Jedi Alethea posted the following link at the Coelescere Enclave forum, which details the development of solar panel roads in the US. If this takes off and is adopted it could provide enough energy to replace all centralized power stations, including coal and nuclear power stations, in the US, and provide power to all homes and business in the US.

 http://www.gizmag.com/solar-panel-roads/12780/

 I just hope that this prototype road surface is adopted and the technology exported to all countries around the world.

This idea could save the planet.

May the Force be with You

Jedi Richard Strange

Should you wish to join the Coelescere Enclave of Jedi, then answer the questions below as best you can, and post your answers as part of your introduction at the Coelescere Enclave forum if you like. If you do not know the answer then answer with honesty at least. My own answers to these 7 questions are below, but you should answer with your own words and being. Remember - See right through you, some of us can.

Coelescere Enclave of Jedi

[Please find listed below some questions as requested to ask new members before joining. The first six were from Jedi Jason. The long winded one I added - Jedi Rivan]

1) Away from all the text books and the Jedi Code what does the Force mean to you?

2) How do you use / interact with it?

3) What do you feel you can contribute to the growing community?

4) How did you come to jedism?

5) How does it fit / Or not fit in with existing belief systems you may have or brought up in?

6) What traits do you feel best serve being Jedi and why?

7) Jedi come from many different beliefs. For some they have left those beliefs behind and for others they use thier spiritual past to enlighten their spiritual future. How open are you to learning and working with people of diverse religious backgrounds. How do you feel about learning from the scriptures and teachers of other religions to enlighten our own walk? Our society too often teaches us that beliefs are an “either/or” situation. One thing I was taught at seminary was that beliefs can be “both/and”.

Jedi Richard Strange Answers

1).

The Force is an emanation and an energy of many qualities - most likely quantum in nature, though it surrounds and flows through us, and binds together all life with purpose. Consciousness, which seems to be also quantum in nature, may just be another aspect of the Force, and allows us to feel our own connection to the Force, through consciousness, our senses and our feelings - the more stilled your mind, the easier it is to feel.

2).

I interact with the Force only whilst truly mindful. The quality of a stilled mind during mindfulness allows you to concentrate without concentration. The quality of true compassion comes if the bridge of consciousness leaps between heart and mind, and allows right action with insight. When I am sat still in mindfulness, I am connected to the Force, and may sometimes feel things, which I am still learning to identify (disturbances). The Force also allows action and creativity, but be mindful to return to the stilled mind after using your brain for thought and creative purposes and action - you will lose your connection to the Force if you do not return.

Whilst mindful I also practise various uses of the Force including: self healing techniques, psychic defence techniques, energy absorption and flow techniques, and energy sharing techniques (with plants and trees mainly), amongst others (listening to feeling, and learning when I do - or not). I am also learning to feel truth and meaning in the Force - this can be useful when reading or listening.

3).

My time, knowledge and experience - maybe more, maybe less, depending upon the ebb and flow of life, and what I’m doing.

4).

I’m beginning to believe I was born for it. I wanted to be a knight before Star Wars first appeared, and I have found that the jedi way as portrayed in the movies, and some of the literature, to be apt to my own life and experience. I sometimes use quotations or variations of those from Star Wars, as they are personal to me and they fit what I am writing or saying.

5).

I have studied and applied knowledge and ways of most of today’s major religions and ways, to some small degree, if not more, though my studies and practise have not been confined to these areas alone (lol a little bit here, a little bit there). I am only a jedi - this is enough for me. If everyone stops believing I will be the last.

6).

Mindfulness is the key, the door, and beyond are feelings in the Force. If you are not there already then question what I say. An inquisitive mind may lead you down the right paths, but you will not learn if you do not question and then practise what you have learned. Compassion serves a jedi well - it is a doorway to peace, and a reward of mindfulness.

7).

I have walked the path of the comparative theologist, and still find time to find and learn more. The seeking has not stopped, this is the way it should be, as you may find purpose in the seeking - do not limit yourself only to theology.

Do not ignore calls to action, or feelings to be still.

May the Force be with You

Jedi Richard Strange

I’ve just been invited by Jedi Rivan Elan, and accepted into the ranks of the Coelescere Enclave, a community for jedi of serious mind. In fact you might not be granted much access to view or post until you’ve been accepted as a real jedi. Anyone is welcome, however, to come and have a look at what we are doing.

The following page will no doubt chart my progress as I explore this small but growing community of serious jedi.

Coelescere Enclave, Unity in the Jedi Way, and Jedi Praxeums around the World

Some of the Enclave’s jedi are already well known to me, after interacting at various jedi venues online, and feel like friends. My own studies will continue as I grow in the Force, but I hope that I can contribute in meaningful ways, and be of service whilst here.

I guess I will now also be posting Coelescere Enclave news here on this blog

May the Force be with You

Jedi Richard Strange

 Yellowstone National Park’s famous Cottonwood Pack has just been destroyed — all the adult wolves have been killed and the surviving pups will likely die without their wolf family. These are just some of the latest victims of the federal government’s likely illegal decision to eliminate vital protections for our wolves in Greater Yellowstone and the northern Rockies.

The next few weeks will be crucial for the wolves in the Greater Yellowstone region. The future of wolves in the northern Rockies is at a crossroads — and it will take the voices of caring wildlife supporters like you and me to make a difference.

I just signed Defenders’ petition to Secretary Ken Salazar — and I hope you will, too. Please sign on today and help support a lasting future for wolves in America.

May the Force be with You

Jedi Richard Strange

A new effort to find unity for the jedi around the world has been started at the Jedi Unity Work Group, which I’m participating in.

http://jediunityworkgroup.ning.com/

So if you’re a practising jedi, or a padawan still, come and have a look at the instructions on the following page - we need real jedi from the jedi community across the world to participate in this important work, but we can’t really start the work until we have enough representatives of enough perspectives to give a rounded view.

http://jediunityworkgroup.ning.com/notes/Notes_Home

May the Force be with You

Jedi Richard Strange