“OH, GREAT WHITE SPIRIT ..."

　No book dealing with the teachings of Silver Birch would be complete without one of his invocations. Every week he opens the circle with a beautiful prayer, stressing the same truths but always couched in different phrasing. This one is typical and has not previously appeared in print:

　I PRAY to the Great White Spirit that we may be enabled to reveal the operation of the laws that belong to the spiritual realms. I pray that we may be enabled to give a clearer understanding of the Great Spirit and His relationship to all the phenomena of life and to all His children who dwell in the universe.

　The Great Spirit has been so misunderstood throughout the centuries, misinterpreted, limited and restricted that we seek to reveal the Great Spirit as perfect law in operation. The Great Spirit is responsible for every manifestation of life. All that exists does so because of His power and His sustenance. The whole order of creation pays tribute to His Law. The mightiest and the lowliest, the strongest and the weakest, the birds, the flowers, the trees, the wind, the ocean, the moun-tain, the hills and the vales, the sunshine and the rain, the storm and the lightningーall these are but expressions of the Great Spirit of all life.

　We seek to reveal that all are fashioned in His spiritua. image, that His spirit manifests through their being, that they move and breathe and live because the Great Spirit is within them and they are within the Great Spirit. None has the power to come between the child and the Father, for all the inspiration, all the truth, all the wisdom, all the revelation, all the knowledge that belongs to that infinite reservoir can be reached by each child of the Great Spirit as he desires, in aspiration, humility and service, to become an instrument for that mighty power.

　We seek to reveal the greatness latent within every human soul, the mighty force waiting to be released, pent up through misunderstanding, waiting to surge through the physical being and express spiritual heights in their daily lives. We would seek to make all children live lives in fullness, in beauty, in understanding of the purpose for which they were born, so that they might extract from life all the richness, all the sweetness, all the beauty that is theirs for the asking.

　We seek to bring the Great Spirit closer to His children and His children nearer to the Great Spirit, to overcome all the obstacles that stand in the way, to banish all the restrictions and limitations so that the children of His world of matter may know the Great Spirit and seek to reveal Him in service. That is the prayer of Thy Indian servant, who seeks to serve.

　At the conclusion of every circle, the guide gives the sitters a benediction, always reminding them of the “cloud of witnesses” with which they are surrounded and stressing the inherent divinity of us all. Here is one such benediction:

　I WANT you to know that we are close to you, even when you cannot hear us, even when it seems that we are invisible, unseen, unheard, unfelt.

　We are around and about you because we love you, and the love that we have for you makes us always seek to serve you and, through you, those who require service—the weak ones, the ones who have lost their strength, the ones who have fallen by the wayside, the derelicts of your world, the　weary and struggling souls who do not know where to turn, who can find no comfort in the religion of earthly churches but who have a yearning for truth, those whose souls seek expression but who are choked by the creed and the dogma and the teaching of opposing sects.

　The truth that we teach is the truth of the Great Spirit that knows no bounds and no limitation. It is for all, not for one. It seeks to embrace the whole of humanity within its loving embrace.

　May you become conscious of that mighty power that is around and about you, of the great love that is always being poured into your world, the inspiration that seeks to express itself through you, the truth that is waiting to be revealed, the wisdom that seeks to illumine your world, and may you strive through service to make yourselves accessible to the mighty power of the spirit, so that you may become at one with the great Force, the Great Spirit, that is behind it all, so that, working in unison with His laws and filled with His knowledge, you may become instruments of His servants for all His children. May the Great Spirit bless you all.