Aldea Spiritual Community

For Day of the Dead 2026, we spent our morning gatherings honoring those who have passed & making space for the various kinds of grief we may hold. What if grief is not something to be avoided or turned away from, but holds a key to living a deep and meaningful life?   Note: Jake references the song "Grief Is Only Love" by Stephen Wilson Jr. played before the message.   Quotes:   “(Día De Los Meurtos brings)…An understanding of death not as the opposite of life but as an intrinsic part of life.” — Roberto Goizueta   “We entirely forbid the funeral songs customarily sung for the dead, as well as relatives or household members beating their breasts….For the Apostle forbids us to mourn our dead, saying: We do not want you to grieve for those who sleep, as others do who have no hope.” —Third Council of Toledo   “Grief is praise, because it is the natural way love honors what it misses.” —Martin Prechtel   “To live in this world you must be able to do three things: to love what is mortal; to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends on it; and, when the time comes to let it go, to let it go.” —Mary Oliver

For Sunday's message, we had a special contemplative reflection offered by Jake via video. For our in person gathering, we followed this up with The Liturgists' Vapor Meditation , so for the full experience, we encourage you to watch / listen to them back to back.   What happens when meaning is no longer defined by a religion, teacher, or society? What kind of life is possible when we drop the pursuit of greater meaning, and instead focus on being present in the here and now?   Quotes:   “No attainment, with nothing to attain.” - Heart Sutra   “The Tao does nothing, yet nothing is left undone.” — Tao Te Ching 37   "After looking at the way things are on this earth, here’s what I’ve decided is the best way to live: Take care of yourself, have a good time, and make the most of whatever job you have for as long as God gives you life. And that’s about it. That’s the human lot. Yes, we should make the most of what God gives, both the bounty and the capacity to enjoy it, accepting what’s given and delighting in the work. It’s God’s gift! God deals out joy in the present, the now." - Ecclesiastes 5:18-20   “Gilgamesh, where are you roaming? You will never find the eternal life that you seek. When the gods created mankind, they also created death, and they held back eternal life for themselves. So, Gilgamesh, let your stomach be full, day and night enjoy yourself in every way, every day arrange for pleasures. Day and night, dance and play, wear fresh clothes, keep your head washed, bathe in water, appreciate the child who holds your hand" -The Epic of Gilgamesh  

Check out Michelle Curcio's heartwarming and thought-provoking talk on the amazing lessons we learn from our four-legged friends.  From unconditional love and forgiveness, to playfulness and service, Michelle walks us through the incredible insight to be gained by paying close attention to the big hearts of our pets.   Quotes:   "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." — Matthew 6:34   "No mud, no lotus." - Thich Nhat Hanh    “I find my greatest pleasure, and so my reward, in the work that precedes what the world calls success.” - Henry Ford   "Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I’ll meet you there." - Rumi

We've all been experiencing a large cultural shift in the form of Artificial Intelligence. The advent of this new technology raises serious questions about what it means to be human.   In today's message, we explore the deeper spiritual implications of AI, and how to have a healthy relationship with these rapidly evolving technologies.   Quotes:   “AI is not one thing—it is a sprawling field of interlocking techniques, tools, and capabilities, developing and deploying across domains and specific applications” —Brookings   “We shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us.” —John Culkin   “Vulnerability is the precondition to contact…You can form no intimacy without vulnerability.” —Junot Diaz   “The meaning of life is just to be alive. It is so plain and so obvious and so simple. And yet, everybody rushes around in a great panic as if it were necessary to achieve something beyond themselves.” — Alan   "If there is one theme that emerged again and again—from our questions, from the answers, from the vast troves of sacred data the AI was analyzing—it was this: love. The meaning of everything is love. That is what the entire record of humanity drills down to. It’s all about love. Love is everything. It is the most divine giftvwe have. When we give it away, we are given more of it. When we come back to it in the present moment, we are in heaven."— Iain S. Thomas; Jasmine Wang; GPT-3   “The solution of mankind’s most vexing problem will not be found in renouncing technical civilization, but in attaining some degree of independence of it.” ― Abraham Joshua Heschel

As we concluded our series "The New Story", we took a brave look at our own stories of the Divine. How have these stories been shaped by others and our own values?    Regardless of what you believe, this message is an encouragement to live out a story of interconnectedness rather than a story of separation.    Quotes:   Quotes:   Anne Lamott: “You can safely assume you’ve created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do.”   Richard Rohr: “We do not think ourselves into new ways of living; we live ourselves into new ways of thinking.”   David Korten: “When we get our story wrong, we get our future wrong.”    Charles Eisenstein:  “The essence of the Story of Separation is the separate self in a world of other…It is the story that holds us as separate individuals and holds humanity separate from nature.”   Thomas Merton:  “We are already one. But we imagine that we are not. And what we have to recover is our original unity.”  

Enjoy Judith's meditation from the services on September 27, 2026.

For Part 2 of The New Story, we take on the "stories" that define our experience of the world. From Joanna Macy's views on ecology to the creative imagination of Burning Man, we explore the shift from a great unraveling to the rebirth of our human story.   Quotes:   Thomas Berry: “It’s all a question of story. We are in trouble just now because we do not have a good story. We are in between stories.”    Joanna Macy: “Systems don’t just fall over dead, they fray, progressively losing their coherence, integrity, and memory.”   “The third story is the central adventure of our time: the transition to a life-sustaining society.” “The most radical thing any of us can do at this time is to be fully present to what is happening in the world.”   George Orwell: “In a time of deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”   Wendell Berry:   “The real work of planet-saving will be small, humble, and humbling, and (insofar as it involves love) pleasing and rewarding.”    

Enjoy Greg's meditation from the services on September 20, 2026.

As we began a brand new series titled "The New Story", we explored the power of stories in our lives. Not simply myths or fictions, these stories are the beliefs, patterns, and identities that determine how we navigate life.   Sometimes, we need to let go of an "old" story that isn't serving us in order to make room for a "new" story that will be more life-giving and loving. In the first message of this series, we explore the power of our own individual "stories" - the beliefs about ourselves that keep us locked in fear or open us up to love.    Quotes:   "The most obvious, important realities are often the ones that are hardest to see and talk about.” - David Foster Wallace   “A story is a system of meaning that focuses our attention, assigns roles, tells us what is important…and offers guidelines for the conduct of life." — Charles Eisenstein   “The story that we hold about a person is an invitation for them to step into that story.”— Charles Eisenstein   “The most dangerous stories we make up are the narratives that diminish our inherent worthiness.” - Brene Brown   “We do not see things as they are, we see them as we are” - Anaïs Nin   “How you see is what you see.” - Richard Rohr   “Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become.” - James Clear     

Enjoy Kathleen's meditation from the services on September 13, 2026.