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Drum Dance
Drum Dance, September 25-27
By Perry Robinson
To all Drum Dancers and Drum Dance Support People since 1994!
This is a special invitation to everyone who has ever danced the Drum Dance or who has supported the Drum Dance here at the Center to come and dance September 25-27! It is really great that many of you have already registered for this Dance. Wouldn’t it be cool if this turned into a Center for Peace Drum Dance Reunion! And what a great way for the new Drum Dancers to experience the power of the dance!
Can you hear the drums calling?
This is year 16 for the Tennessee Drum Dance--the North of the North on the Medicine Wheel [4th year of the 4th cycle]. The North brings to mind the elders and ancestors and fireside remembering of all that has transpired in the other seasons and cycles. We are inviting everyone who has ever danced the Drum Dance here at the Center to return to the Center and dance this year. We are inviting all those who have been on the support crew to come and dance too!
This is a dance of transition. Last year, Chief Perry was guided to pass the “Drumstick” to Candy Barbee, who has danced nine Drum Dances held here at the Center. We shall be Co-Chiefs this year; then Candy will be our Drum Dance Chief and Perry will retire from that position.
As Co-Chiefs, we call out to Drum Dancers, Drummers, Fire Keepers, Kitchen Angels, and other support staff, to gather on September 25 by noon, please, asking Spirit to help us create the Drum Dance in our midst. The Dance always comes; we are changed; we are filled; and each dance is unique!
Like all mystical experiences, words fail to describe the Drum Dance in a definitive way. When Joseph Rael, Beautiful Painted Arrow, led the first Drum Dance here in 1994, people experienced inspiration and life changes. We at the Center shall always be grateful to Joseph for all that he has done for so many of us in bringing the dances here to the Center for Peace.
We cannot tell you what your experience will be. We shall begin the Drum Dance with a Sweat Lodge, during which we shall all ask Spirit to over-light the Dance and guide each of us, then we shall follow what is given.
“The Drum will call you!” If you feel/hear the call of the Drum, come; come to the Dance!
This year the Dance will be a Giveaway from the Center for Peace and the Chiefs. That means that you look into your heart and billfold and see what is right for you to give this year. If green energy is totally out of the question for you, donations of items and/or work are also appropriate.
For the Drum Dance the dancers do not have personal support people. We still need a few people for crew. Please register on line if at all possible or send an email to Candy or Perry if you plan to dance or be on the crew.
For information or if you need answers to questions, call Candy (865-933-9327), Perry [865 428-3070], or Drum Dance Coordinator, Marcus Weseman [865-463-1002 (evening) and 576-3420 (daytime)].
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Healing Gathering
Healing Gathering and Camp-Out Fund Raiser
October 9,10, 11
This first time event is designed to introduce the community at large to various healrs in the area. Practitioners in Massage, Qi Gong, Intuitive Readings, Crystal Healing and Huna Healing are already registered. There is still plenty of room for practitioners (we will be using the SunMoon Dance Arbor for this event-giving us 20 spaces under roof.)
Participants pay $50 each for the weekend that begins on Friday night with drumming around a bonfire. Saturday 10:00 to 4:00 will be broken into15 or 30 minute segments where participants rotate from healer to healer. There will be some group sessions as well such as yoga, yoga dance, tai chi, etc. Many of these practitioners charge from $50-$100 per hour, so this Gathering is a unique opportunity to sample several healing modalities such as massage, acupressure, reflexology, Reiki, gemstone healing, Huna, readings and many more.
We are serving soup (meat and vegetarian) with bread and a cookie for $3.00 at lunch on Saturday. Drinks and snacks will be for sale at the Camp Store Tent as well as jewelry, crystals, gemstones, books, artwork and various other wonderful items. You will need to bring your own food for all other meals.
Saturday night we will have another bonfire for roasting hot dogs and marsh mellows as well as singing and drumming. Sunday morning we will have a non-denominational service- followed by a Sweat Lodge for those who want to participate.
You are welcome to come and camp for the weekend or just come for Saturday.
Camping is primitive- compost toilets and no showers. Water is available. Bring a grill or camp-stove: no open fires other than bonfires mentioned.
Please do not bring animals.
Children are welcome, and we will have a Children’s Program during the Healing Sessions on Saturday only for a charge of $12 each child (includes lunch.) You will be responsible for your children at ALL other times.
Please register in advance on the Center for Peace Website to come as a practitioner or as a participant. We have limited space, so please register early for camping.
Please call 865-428-3070 for other questions.
Info and Provider's Registration for Healing Gathering
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Corn Harvest Dance
The gathering of the harvest has been celebrated for centuries
around the world in the form of harvest festivals and celebrations of
thanksgiving. Although the modern day celebration of Thanksgiving is
relatively “new” in historic terms, harvest festivals are not.
Different cultures from the ancient Egyptians to Pagan practices in
Europe have celebrated the gathering of the harvest and given thanks
for the blessings each provided. These festivals often began with a
fast or purification in preparation of receiving the gifts of the
harvest and included dancing, games and ceremonies honoring the Creator
and spirit of the crops, ending with a feast of the crops harvested. In 2002, Candy Barbee was given a vision of war arrows being shot into the sky. As the arrows neared  the
apex, they turned into corn arrows and fell into the earth as planted
corn. In the Fall of that year, the vision came into being as the Corn
Harvest Dance. The Energy of this Dance is about Harvesting that which
we have planted as well as transmuting any energies that prevent us
from receiving these gifts. It is about rejoicing our abundance;
dancing gratitude and praise for all we have harvested in the past
year, and setting intentions/seeds for what we hope to harvest next
fall. The Dance Arbor is unique in that it is a square within a circle
within a square with 4 directional fires, which assist in connecting
with the Energy of the Stars. Although there are Firekeepers and
Drummers, everyone sleeps in tents around the arbor, dances, fasts and
participates in the ceremonies. All traditions are welcome and we will
begin the dance by asking all of the traditions to play together for
the weekend. So that her vision could expand and evolve, last
year Candy received the guidance to pass the service of Dance Chief
onto Robbie Warren, Munay Spirit Center in Charlotte, NC and Margarita
DiVita, Center For Peace in Seymour, TN. In honor of the vision, the
three of us will serve as Dance Chiefs as we dance the 6th Corn Harvest
Dance in 7 years. We invite you to join us with an open heart and mind
as we dance in JOY the Harvest of our Gifts of Abundance. For further information email: Candy Barbee, Robbie Warren or Margarita DiVita Or call Margarita (865) 767-2701.
Register & more information Corn Harvest Dance
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Sweat Lodge
 A
sweat lodge or "Purification Lodge", is an intensely rewarding experience. By
entering the womb of Mother Earth (the lodge), we seek purification
and a deeper spiritual awareness through prayer.
Generally speaking the experience is to deepen spiritual awareness.
The steam, heat, and darkness intensify prayers and personal
introspection. The lodge leader (pourer), with help from the fire
tender, hold an energetic space of safety and security while setting
the intent of the lodge. The medicine of the lodge leader and of
each participant helps to enrich the lessons of the lodge.
There are composting toilets in the meadow. You may change clothes
in these toilets or at the Peace Sound Chamber. There is no nudity
in our lodges.
Suggested Items to Bring:
• Two Towels
• Men are requested to wear swim trunks, gym shorts or something
similar.
• Women are requested to wear a skirt or dress. (Something for
inside the sweat that is modest and you don’t mind getting muddy.)
• Change of clothes (Preferably long sleeve and covers all of the
legs to keep from getting the feast area dirty).
• Covered Dish for the Feast.
It is appropriate to bring tobacco, a small gift, or monetary gift
for the fire-keeper and lodge master, both of whom offer their
services to the people as a gift.
Cash donations are used to support the Sweat Lodge. We use lots of
wood for the fire; supplies like herbs (sage, tobacco, cornmeal,
etc.), drinking water, and more. If you are feeling abundant, a
donation would be appreciated.
There is never a charge for Ceremony. If you are not feeling
abundant, PLEASE do not allow this to prevent you from coming.
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Fire Ceremony
7th of each month, 7 pm
~ led by Katy Koontz
The purpose of the FIRE CEREMONY is to heal and purify both the
planet’s physical oceans and the oceans of cosmic thought.
At 7 pm local time, fire elders light ceremonial fires at each of
the Peace Sound Chambers around the world. Those present watch the
fire in silence until it burns out, giving to it what we want to
transmute in our lives and staying open to the messages and
teachings it brings. All are welcome. We suggest you arrive around
6:45 pm.
Donations are appreciated.
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Drumming Circle
Every Friday @ 7 pm
~led by José and Tamy
 Drumming is a powerful, sometimes dramatic, way to break into other
levels of our mind. Sensitive instruments can measure the way that
drumming affects the brain waves. That’s the reason for tens of
thousands of years the shaman has journeyed with the drum.
This drumming is not specifically for journeying; but you get to use
it whatever way you wish – including having a good time doing it!
So, on Friday of each week, bring your drum, and come join us.
Donations are appreciated.
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Book Review
THE HOUR I FIRST BELIEVED
by Wally Lamb.  I don't usually review novels although I read them ferociously, but this recent novel about the trickle down effects of tragedy seemed too good to pass up. Caelum Quirk (don't you just love the name) is an English teacher, married for the third time, when he finds out that his wife, Maureen, is having any affair. After a physical altercation with her lover, he finds himself unemployable in the small town school system where they live and moves to Colorado to be closer to Maureen's father. There in Middleton, he teaches English and she is a part-time school nurse at Columbine High school. During April of his first year teaching there, Caelum finds out that his only living relative, his father's sister Lolly, has had a stroke and so he returns East to care for her. When the fateful day arrives for Columbine high school, his wife ends up hiding in a cabinet in the library office for hours listening to the shrieks and gunfire as the perpetrators stalk through the school murdering classmates and teachers. When Caelum flies home, he does not yet know if his wife is among the dead. He finds her alive but profoundly changed by her experience. PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder) is the diagnosis the doctors give, but he finds little comfort as the next years revolve around Maureen's illness which makes it impossible for her to function normally. She uses tranquilizers to cope and becomes addicted. Finally he moves her back to the farmhouse he grew up in Connecticut, next door to Quirk Correctional Institute, a women's prison founded by his grandmother. In what seems like a long segue into Caelums' past, we learn about his great-grandmother who was an abolitionist and women's rights activist, his grandmother who founded the prison and his own past. The lies and secrets of his past which have shaped him into the person he became. And a horrible accident which places Maureen in the very prison founded by his ancestors. All through the narrative, Lamb shows the choice to face or ignore crises, to be truthful or hide from the truth, to accept, love and forgive or to hold on to the biases of our upbringing that form our day to day existence. In spite of all that occurs and because of it, we ever have the option of believing in the Spirit of love and forgiveness. CRose --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Perry's Ponderings
Opening the time capsule By Perry Robinson We human beings seem fascinated with the passage of time. Self aware enough to notice that the time of a life span is limited, we tend to make markers, to extend past our life span as a sign that we existed and that we had certain thoughts. Many of these markers are placed with people’s bodies in their graves. Loved ones place objects in graves and tombs with the bodies of their friends and loved ones, objects which indicate who this person was, what they thought and felt. When my dad died in 1990, my niece placed into his casket the paperback western novel he was reading in his final moments. He loved to read those novels about “cowboys and Indians”: Zane Grey, Louis L’Amour, and many others. That’s the way he amused himself much of his life, especially during his last ten years. Graveyards and trash dumps in one era become archeological digs in another age. They become time capsules. Other time capsules are in the form of monuments made of stone or some other long lasting material. Stonehenge, the pyramids, earthen mounds, carved stones, clay tablets and figurines, carved statues, art objects, circles of trees, and grave markers are purposefully created, perhaps in part at least, so that people in the future will notice them and become curious enough to desire to figure out why they were created and what information they convey. Like all sciences, archaeology is based upon theories that help interpret the information that is conveyed by these markers from the past. It must be fascinating to study the past in this way. I am amazed by the tools and technology that modern science has brought to the field of archaeology in our day. With the study of DNA, for instance, the inter-connectedness and movement of our ancient ancestors can be examined in rather minute detail. All of the possibilities of this are fascinating and exciting; and I love it as much as the next guy. I believe, though, that there is another whole segment of archaeology that is rarely examined yet universally available: the archaeology of the soul. If we, as many say, are nothing but energy, what if energetically we “contain” all the data of all our human experiences – past, present, and future? If you believe this lifetime is the only one we have, I know I just lost you. But, if I didn’t lose you there, let’s look at that a little. Religionists who believe the ancient writings remind themselves from time to time that human beings were “created in the image of the Gods”. Though not a religionist, I believe that. Not only do I believe that: I believe that aspect of human beings has never changed and that we cannot change it. It is a big chunk of the energy that we are. Whatever we have experienced or shall experience, if there is anything that appears to be “not a part” of our “god life”, I believe that “appearance” was generated by our own choices and has no reality beyond the energy of mental focus that we give it. But no amount of focus can MAKE IT REALLY REAL. This takes up a notch or two the idea, that the there is no time or place in which Creator Presence does not dwell. Anything that we see “outside” ourselves is always and only seen through our own –inner – point of view. Any time I experience something and decide to see it as hurt, bad, fear, etc., it is that emotional value with which I remember that incident—without thinking about it. That’s the way we have accumulated such a vast amount of memory that there are some things that slipped through Creator’s grasp and are really “bad”. Our memory is truly a time capsule and those emotional values are the markers. That’s the reason archaeology of the soul – what I call “soul mining” – may be important. When we catch ourselves dwelling on something “bad” that happened, I suspect that judgment was only a knee-jerk habitual response, based on our soul memory. What if we changed our minds and decided, very intentionally, to look at every experience without judgment and allowed the incident to offer its gift to us, rather than cutting off that gift and rejecting it outright as “bad”? What if we double checked the markers in the time capsule of our cellular/soul memory, looking at them with the idea that each was a gift. I believe that every time we intentionally do this, we send a demand in every direction through the corridors of time that maybe these experiences were not all bad, but that they each had a gift offered to us, which we rejected at the time. This energetic possibility, zinged through the corridors of time, – especially if it becomes more and more frequent – will transform the energy of past history and the shape of future potential! Because that zing will be looking for gold and ignoring the “crap”. Gold mining – “soul mining” – can end up both fun and life [and world] transforming. We can do this! Correction: WE ARE DOING THIS! When a dancer dances up the stuff, dances it out, and dances new life into being, when we practice deep forgiveness, when we let go the bindings of our lives, that is what is happening. The New Heaven and the New Earth are becoming a time capsule for the next age of humankind.
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Calendar at a Glance
WEEKLY
Tuesdays, 7:30 pm
"Messiah" Training
Wednesday & Friday 10am
Yoga with Sandy Palmer
Fridays, 7pm
Drumming Circle
SEPTEMBER
September 12, 10am
Saturday Sweat Lodge
William Charles Patterson "Crow Caller"
September 17, 6:30 pm
Thursday Night Sweat Lodge
Steve Citty
September 20, 4:00 pm
Monthly Council Meeting
September 25-27
Drum Dance
OCTOBER
October 7, 6:45 pm
Fire Ceremony
October 10-12
Healing Gathering
October 15, 6:30 pmThursday Night Sweat Lodge
Steve Citty
October 18, 4:00 pm
Monthly Council Meeting
October 25-27
Corn Harvest Dance
October 31, 10am
Saturday Sweat Lodge
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Chanting in the Chamber
The Peace Sound Chamber is available for chanting, vision quests and ceremonies of many different types.
You
are encouraged to come to the chamber and chant, drum, meditate or
simply sit (the chamber Spirits love it); please check first that there
is not something already scheduled.
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Council Meeting
This is the gathering of the board of directors to discuss new ideas, future projects, and events. Feel free to come with suggestions and comments.
June 7, 5 pm - visitors welcome
For more information, call the Center at (865) 428-3070.
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Council Members
The Center for Peace is a non-profit religious corporation in the State of Tennessee. Donations to the Center for Peace can be claimed as deductions from income for income tax purposes.
Active Council Members of the Center for Peace:
Candy Barbee
Knoxville
865-933-9327
Nan Citty
Knoxville
865-405-6809
Steve Citty
Knoxville
865-300-4424
Margarita DiVita
Jefferson City
865-475-3799
Al Fletcher
Norris
865-494-9950
Katy Koontz
Knoxville
865-693-9845
Cheryl Patterson
Seymour
865-453-3869
Jim Phillips
Knoxville
865-971-1959
Jeanne Robinson
Seymour
865-428-3070
Perry Robinson
Seymour
865-428-3070
Marcus Weseman
Clinton
865-463-1002
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