Lisa Romero uses the terms “sun karma” and “moon karma” to explore our sense of conflict and despair in current world affairs. In her view, the tension is a positive sign: the “law of love” is seeking to take root in the world and in human souls. This offers a new perspective on leadership. For her, the divine feminine represents a way in which the human soul brings this new leadership into being. Laura Scappaticci asks the questions.
Laura Scappaticci: What do you observe happening in the world?
Lisa Romero: A totally new law for humanity, what I refer to as sun karma or the law of love, seems to be deeply adjusting our world. However, most of humanity still lives by the moon karma law inwardly.
How do you understand the difference between these two types of karma?
Sun karma was written in the hearts that could hear the Sermon on the Mount, but it wasn’t really activated in the collective consciousness. Only now are we beginning to see it as a new way of understanding karmic law. I can give an example of sun karma by looking at today’s leaders. Through the lens of sun karma, leaders and those who have great influence on groups of people and our future are in their positions not because they have the greatest connection to the spirit, as it once was, but because they have the greatest “debt.” The new sun karma law doesn’t say an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, like the moon karma of the past. It says if you have a debt, you will be given more opportunity to serve, to give, and to love. From this perspective, we wouldn’t assume that people are given a privileged position of leadership because they have earned it. Rather, they’re given an opportunity to serve the good because this is the new way to balance debt. They will certainly be tempted to repeat the past imbalance or the error that put them in that place because that’s what happens with moon karma. You’re presented with the opportunity to lead differently into the future, and your ego must rise up and meet it anew.
Most of us are still caught in the psyche of moon karma. In simple terms, we think that when something “goes right,” we must have done something right to deserve it, and when something “goes wrong,” we must be off track. In situations in the world, such as in Palestine, we hear people say things like, “Well, they have the right to retaliate tooth for tooth.” That’s an example of moon karma. Even people who have no relationship to the concept of karma whatsoever can be bound to the idea of, “I give you something and you must give me something in return.” We say, “what goes around comes around” or “they will get their comeuppance,” as my mother says. That’s all moon karma thinking. We continue to create lawfulness out of something that is no longer the living law.
The transition from moon to sun karma will no doubt be difficult for people to understand and take hold of. How do we change our perspective?
When spiritual realities come into the being, an individual might be inspired by the spiritual world that is working towards the divinely willed future. But it requires a group, even a small group, to inscribe that inspiration into the etheric. Success is achieved when we see the ability for humanity as a whole to perceive what has been inscribed by a group.
We could say that the success of sun karma law coming into the collective consciousness, for which Rudolf Steiner was a great initiator, is now being perceived by many people because we can look at our leaders and think, “They’re corrupt” or “They’re being corrupted.” The fact that we are collectively aware shows that it is manifesting. What’s tricky is that when something manifests in the earth sphere but is not yet taken up by individuals with understanding and wisdom, it comes as a struggle. When it hits the collective consciousness, it reveals itself as chaos and a challenge. But that means it’s starting to penetrate humanity.
What might we notice during this transition?
The whole struggle will be more present than ever. What we’re going to see in the external world is both an increase of the moon karma behaviours and an ability for people to see that it isn’t right anymore. In the Sermon on the Mount, we were given the picture of “turn the other cheek.” We were given the Beatitudes. We were given the Lord’s Prayer. These pictures are esoteric and profound. So much was given that referred to a new way of being, a new karmic law.
I’ve noticed people on social media saying that Christian leaders are not bringing true Christianity. This sun karma way of being is not about power or punishment or exclusion. Is this a picture of the imbalance that people are noticing?
Absolutely. That’s what I love about new spiritual laws revealing themselves on the world stage. But this is the hard thing: the world stage will not portray it with wisdom, understanding, and ease. There will be outer conflict until the new way is embedded as deeply in our souls as the old way is today. The group that was around Steiner and received pictures of sun karma into their souls succeeded in helping unfold this new law of love because it can’t go onto the world stage without a process that first works through the individual, then the group, and then the greater world. It’s taken up by human souls. If they can hear it, if they can perceive it, then they’ve taken it in, and it’s brought it down into the world etheric, and a seal is made for others to access.
It’s going to take a long time to integrate all the sun karmic ways and for everyone to be aware that having influence means having indebtedness: if you’re given the opportunity to serve more, you need to give more and love more. “You did that to me, I now do this to you,” and “I have done this work, so I deserve this compensation,” are still strong aspects of our human psyche. But it is changing. A sign of this is that we can feel that a person doesn’t get a certain position because they don’t have the same debt, even though they may be the better person to carry the task. There’s a shift in our understanding of karmic indebtedness. How do we work with that? How do we work to understand that when we are looking for new leadership?
Like in the anthroposophical society, a Waldorf school, or a country?
Exactly. Anywhere you’re going to have an influence over a group of people. What would power look like when it is the power of love and not the love of power?
The picture that we have of resilience has changed, too. When we say to children, “Tough it out. Have grit,” we are essentially saying that they should be able to manage pain, discomfort, and challenge on their own. If they don’t, they are weak. This is akin to “You’ll get yours.” But we are starting to realize that resilience isn’t found in the individual. Rather, it is nurtured and strengthened through community and supporting each other. If your resilience comes from your community, rather than just you, that’s a very different picture of transformation, leadership, and healing. Leadership becomes a community task, a group task.
It’s interesting because this connects to what Rudolf Steiner indicated. New group soul forces want to work in a group or people. These are spiritual beings that are seeking to penetrate the change that’s happening within the group, not just the individual. It’s difficult because those who come together as a group often have moon karma that’s brought them together. But the willingness to engage in sun karma, the willingness to not repeat what was, but to engage with the inspiration of the spiritual world, is what’s going to carry us into the future. The moon karma wants to bring the past and repeat it. The sun karma is asking us to work with the living realities of the spiritual world that is seeking a future for humanity. Leaders who are not in connection with this are usually not willing to work intimately in a group.
How are you working with this in your spiritual retreats and educational offerings?
In Ireland, I work with bringing people together in this new way. It’s not easy for people to be on equal footing with everyone else. It’s really hard to work deeply with others. But I think if we understood some of the new lawfulness of the sun karma, we would be more willing to work with others to bring about our collective future, because it reveals that the future of love is known when two or more gather. For me, this is a way to experience the etheric Christ.
So ultimately, if you are put in a leadership position, you hope that you’ll soon be removed from it, because that means you’ve cleared up your debt. And that often happens. People are demoted in the realm of sun karma, not promoted. “The meek shall inherit the earth” is actually a good thing. But it’s very hard because our whole psyche is attuned to another way of thinking about success.
If we make a wish or pray for the world and those in leadership, our wishes and prayers might change if we have sun karma and moon karma in mind.
Yes. I think it does change, and it makes us less disappointed in our leaders. It’s such a fascinating time to live in because everything’s becoming inverted. When this new law came, it couldn’t penetrate humanity. It needed to come through the Michael school and the initiates of that school into the hearts of people who could hear it before it could actually enter into the wider world. Rudolf Steiner wasn’t the only one. Peter Dunov, for example, stated, “You have lived with the law of Karma, now it’s time to live with the law of Christ!”
If Steiner received this over 100 years ago, what does that mean for us, as a group, who are alive now and moving through the world with an anthroposophical worldview?
What really interests me is what deeds of love brought into being by the Christ want to unfold now? What is Michael helping us to grow now? What does a small group like the Anthroposophical Society need to be hearing in their hearts and minds today, to affect humanity in a hundred years? The most important thing is that we’re willing to let things grow when they need to grow and not hold things in the old way because we know it was successful then.
You mentioned in another context that these developments are also connected to the divine feminine. What do you mean by that?
When you’re looking through the eyes of the law of love, you are beginning to connect with a force that is seeking to enter more and more into our lives. We talk about Christ as the being of love, but it’s hard to separate the divine feminine from the divine masculine when we talk about the being of Christ. I love that painting by Leonardo da Vinci, The Redeemer. We don’t know if it is masculine or feminine. How I experience this is that the divine masculine can be connected to the world spirit and the divine feminine to the world soul. The divine masculine holds the ground of the impenetrable holy of holies, the untouchable spirit of my being. The divine feminine allows my soul to open to the outer world, so the world can impress upon my soul and so the other can leave an impression—I can be penetrated by the other to experience the other.
The divine feminine is crucial for experiencing what’s actually taking place. One of the difficulties people have is that they don’t want the impressions of the world to come in. Without that, the higher worlds don’t get to really understand what we’re going through as humans on Earth. Without us going through grief, going through the struggles, the joys, and the delights, without us being moved by the world, we’re not in conversation with the spiritual world. The spiritual world is in conversation with how our souls are moving, not how much is sitting in our intellect. We must have the experiences that come in through the soul—and that links us directly to the divine feminine.
The food we eat goes into our digestive system and creates the forces that help us on a physical level. Cosmic nutrition comes in through our sense impressions. But there is also what we “eat” in our souls—what we give energy, attention, and time to. The soul is often very hungry because it’s on a junk food or very limited diet. We see this in leaders who are surrounded only by those who are just like them—everyone is eating very limited information, and everyone is eating exactly the same thing. Part of my inquiry is the different presentations of Madonna as the divine feminine, because they hold secrets to how the divine feminine is at work. We see the Madonna with the seven swords through the chest, the Madonna with child, the Black Madonna, the Madonna standing on the world, and the Pieta Madonna. Each one is a profound picture of the divine feminine’s role in the cosmic ordering of our souls. I think if we could inquire into these varied pictures, we would understand what the soul is really seeking to “eat”—what we could be giving our energy, attention, and time to.
Take the image of the Black Madonna, which is just one expression of the divine feminine. Some people say she’s a representative of Demeter, the earth goddess. But, through the Egyptian mysteries, she represents the wisdom that everyone will get what they need from the divine feminine. If there was a Black Madonna in the church, you could enter the church and see her even if you were not a part of that parish. This is an image of the divine feminine feeding everyone with the soul impressions that they need for their next stage of development. The wisdom of the church at that time was knowing that there’s a part of the spiritual world that needs to be available to whoever wants to partake.
Are these different Madonnas all different leaders?
I think of them in terms of soul wisdom, because wisdom has to nurture the next generation. How might we bring to children, not “you should be this, you should be that” but “how can I help you be all you need to be?” This image should really come to every child: whatever you need to be, the world will provide it for you.
It’s such a shame that we are educated into competition and social standing when we are so little. Those things have nothing to do with the leadership of the future. I think that’s what the divine feminine is representing: a way of the human soul bringing into being this new leadership.
The Madonna of the Seven Swords is another aspect we’ve talked about: that things have to penetrate, and it’s painful to let the world in. The other Madonna pictures are other aspects of the divine soul at work. I think if future leadership were to embody some of those divine feminine pictures, that would connect with sun karma.
We’re constantly being given the opportunity to move towards the law of love, towards sun karma. At this point in time, we could say that the decision about our future is not made. It’s not, “Oh, it’s already done. We’ve lost. We’ve won.” We don’t fully know where humanity is going. But we know there’s a future willed by the divine that wants to work with us and to help us with our debts. Everything is still at play, even for those who seem to be so far off track. Sun karma is a way for each of us to participate towards the future that is divinely willed.
This article is part of a series that explores qualities of the feminine to bring them into greater conscious awareness and to consider how they might help in addressing the needs of our current world situations.
More Inner Work Path, Preparing for the Christmas Festival
Title image Painting by Sigrid Schenk, pigments and beeswax glaze binder on canvas.
About the Artists
Karo Kollwitz studied Fine Arts at the Bauhaus University Weimar and the HGB Leipzig. She completed a Master of Fine Arts program in Helsinki, Finland, and Weimar as a scholarship holder of the Heinrich Böll Foundation. She has been a guest lecturer at the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar since 2009 and lives and works in Weimar.
Sigrid Schenk lives in Witten as a mother of four, painter, and fellow human being.
I like Lisa’s thinking of the divine masculine as world spirit and divine feminine as world soul. It reminds me of the Foundation Stone “where in the wielding world -creator – God your own I comes into being in the I of God”; and “where in the rhythm of time your own I comes into being in the I of the World”. It simply is a “both/and”, neither one without the other can exist. It has also always helped me from Rudolf Steiner’s karma and reincarnation science to learn that typically we are born in alternating male and female incarnations; and that a male has a female soul and a female has a male soul. It is heart warming to know we are both.