l'Albero della vita has changed its name to Arca della Vita. In the last Albios magazine there was an article about this. It says something like:
From the Tree of Life to the Ark of Life
The metamorphosis of our Association
Dear Member, as you well know Life is movement and metamorphosis and so, also for our Association, after 14 years of life, the moment has ripened to make this change. Such an important and significant change that to honour its function we have decided to close the Tree of Life in the form it has been for these years and to found a new association: The Ark of Life.
I believe I can say that the Tree of Life has played a significant role in the awakening of consciousness in the area of the relationship between the human and Nature and between the human and the Spirit World. But now this phase is over. We now need to work the metamorphosis at a higher level. We now need to prepare those who want to, for the new times that are rushing in.
As a plant, after it has developed its foliage, begins to draw back the leaves to complete its leap into the marvellous world of colour, we also want to make this leap that the times are heralding. I refer, without mincing words, to the so-called Second Coming of Christ, to his return above the clouds, on the etheric plane. Whoever has followed our latest work knows that for 3-4 years this event has become more and more central to our written and spoken work.
But it is not enough.
We now need new clothing for the being of our association, no longer a tree but an ark.
But let’s step back a bit. Perhaps someone has wondered what is meant by the term ‘Tree of Life’? “Who” is the Tree of Life? This tree that grew in the earthly Paradise and to which we could easily reach to receive the fruits of eternal life? Have we ever wondered? As we learned in catechism (and as we teach ourselves in spiritual science) we have chosen the other tree, that of the knowledge of good and evil, and we have fallen here, into the physical-material plane where evil reigns. We must bow our heads and thank the sacrifice of Jesus Christ if we have been able to know Good, the infinite Good that transforms, embracing it with infinite love, the Evil into Good whether it is outside or inside us.
The Tree of Life, in a spiritual sense, is therefore none other than Jesus Christ. Did you know you were linked with His name? I am deeply honoured by the fact that I have been allowed to preside over such an Association.
And what does the Ark mean? We certainly remember the Ark of Noah after the Flood, and also the Ark of covenant given by God to Moses and that accompanied the Chosen People in the process of purification through Sinai that eventually led them victoriously to the Promised Land. But probably not many know another Ark, that named in the Apocalypse 11,19 which goes thus: “And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen (in the incorruptible vision across the incorruptible body with which we see Christ’s actions on the etheric plane) in his temple (earth, the human, the whole of Nature) the ark of his Testament: and there were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an earthquake (the divine manifested right into the depths of the earth – and of the human), and great hail (materialistic thoughts fall and dissolve, like hailstones from the sky representing the head to earth and the physical).”
Now, the Greek word for ark (and John wrote in Greek) is kibotos, and translates exoterically as “Ark of Covenant” and esoterically as “the virgin maid of Israel”.
And who is this virgin Maid of the Chosen People (because that is what Israel really means), if not Mary, the Cosmic Mother? The ark that John sees in the sky, in the divine Temple, is thus the image of Mary, with whose help (Mary our help, our advocate as recited in the Hail Mary) we make a gospel Ark of Covenant between humanity and the Spiritual World. In the next step of the Apocalypse we will not meet the Lady by chance, the Lady who gave birth to the Child, the archetype of the human soul that grows its child inside itself, soul to which Mary extends her protection. We will meet Her by developing a better relationship between Mary and Life. If Life is a gift of the Father, then it follows that the Mother will cause it to flow in each creature, human, animal, plant, stone. Everything is alive, everything pulses like a radiant heart with the forces of Life that the Mother constantly brings us. And John saw Her in the Temple of God, that is the entire Universe.
For all these reasons we realise that the moment has been reached to move from the Tree to the Ark of Life. Maybe we could hazard another image: out of the wood of the Tree the Ark is built of the new covenant between heaven and earth across the interior growth of the human soul and the consequent re-healing of Nature.
Our first steps will be to reconnect with those who have known and supported us in all these years. But we want to infuse a new character into them, a new “colour”: Love, Love that permeates all, Love that transforms all, Love that defeats Evil and embraces it transforming it into Good, Love of the Earth, Heaven and their inhabitants. This love, spiritual love, will be the new impulse that this Ark wants to bring into the world. Freely, fraternally and consciously you are invited to join! Thank you …
Enzo Nastati