In a recent regression intensive, a student was reliving several devastating times in world history, such as the Crusades and the Holocaust. She kept remarking that Mother Mary was there and just watching, witnessing. The student remarked that she too, had been called to witness, in many of her lives, including this one. In the post-session discussion, this experience raised several questions.

We were all struck by the idea of the witness. What is the role of the witness? Since the discussion, I have pondered the roles of Jesus and His mother. History is full of compassion for the suffering of Jesus on the cross, but what about the suffering of His mother, that had to watch, to witness, the crucifixion? Cayce tells us that Jesus and His mother were twin souls, so in some way, half of the twinship is on the cross and the other half is there holding the space in compassion. We all come into this world as half of ourselves. The soul is androgynous. We come in with either the expressed male or female, while the other half is in the subconscious. The anima and animus. It seems that the New Age is about expressing the truer soul consciousness through androgyny. But that’s another topic for another time.

As meditation develops, we begin to develop the consciousness of the witness. One part of our consciousness is in the world doing and another part is observing. In my trance experiences while entering the Oneness, I too, feel that sort of benign neutrality, that sense of pure being. The consciousness of the infinite self is the now. No past, no future – all now.

So is the watcher, the witness, the eternal soul consciousness, overseeing our suffering? The finite consciousness wonders if there could be a God that would allow such suffering. But somehow the witness, offers compassion for our suffering, but knows we must go through this experience, that its temporary. I wonder if that’s what Jesus meant by The Comforter? That somehow He and Mary were part of facilitating that process of internalizing the witness. He and Mary expressed it externally, and now we can do that internally, just as we are all to awaken our own Christ Consciousness. I would surmise this is the New Age message of integration of all into One, of awakening to Oneness.

So is this guidance for us? The Piscean Age was, in a broad brush, an age of feeling while the Aquarian is one of detachment. Are we to heed this counsel? To learn to both be in our experience and also have a part of us witness, in loving detachment? Are Jesus and Mary the model for us, not just in Jesus but also in Mary. Are both needed for enlightened living? So a part of us, like Jesus, lives in the world and rides the waves of pain and joy, while the Mary part, bears witness, compassionately observes. What was modeled outside in Jesus and Mary, is now to be our experience. Jesus and Mary united in our consciousness. The Trinity – the actor, the observer and the consciousness of both/The Creator – the Three in One.

This article is reprinted from a previous issue of Venture Inward magazine, a member-only benefit. To receive your hardcopy each quarter, join the A.R.E. now.