·        March 7-8              Austin, Texas

·        April 18-19             New York City, New York 

·        June 6-7                Asheville, North Carolina

·        July 18-19             San Francisco, California

Update on our CSL Home

As you know, we've gone through several phases in our scavenger hunt search for our new CSL home. We've looked extensively for large and small parcels of land, studied large and small existing retreat centers, and explored possibilities of partnership with other structures of which our CSL home might be a part.

In addition, we've done our homework in both the financial and planning aspects, so that we can be reality based and responsible in our approach.

We believe that we are at a significant moment in this intensive and rewarding process and that's what we want to share with you now.  We  have enough data and have walked through enough of the creative process to bring us to a turning point in our search. To date, three pieces of information have emerged from our search:

1) There is considerable interest and enthusiasm among many of our most active participants for the concept of a CSL retreat center accompanied by land on which residences can be built.

2) The majority of those who would be dedicated to offering monetary contribution or investment are interested in bringing their limited financial resources to support the residential aspect of the project (so that they could buy land to build their own residences) more than to supporting the retreat center itself.

Thus, two factors have come strongly to the fore: the practical conclusion from the above, and a fresh inspiration. First, the realistic conclusion: At this time, we simply don't have the financial backing or capital to pursue the creation of our dream into its material form, without incurring considerable debt up front. And that reality, the financial complexity and the incurring of debt, has called us to make a choice between it and our deeper commitment to simplicity. We feel strongly called to choose simplicity over debt at this time.

Second, and more important, we feel a fresh inspiration to enter into the next approach in our search: that of letting go and letting God. As we all know, the fuller creation of a dream often happens when a person does all that he or she can do (the Western approach), and then stops trying, turning it over to the Creative Source itself to take charge of the final outcome (the Eastern approach). We believe that we are at that important point in this cherished creation.

We're proposing that we put our dream (a home for CSL) entirely into the hands of the Creative Source at this time, in order to give the divine the time and creative space necessary to create the dream's reality in ways that honor both simplicity and economic ease. 

In short, we're proposing that we all stop our "efforting" at finding our CSL home, let go and let God (put it in God's hands), and witness how the divine takes charge of the next steps of this creative process.

For example, at some point someone may feel divinely inspired to donate land or existing buildings to us, or someone might feel moved to finance a major portion of building costs for our new home, or God just might find another approach that our minds haven't even begun to fathom at this time.