Author’s Note: Arriving at the Foundation/Community in 1990 I was fascinated by how the Community had evolved through co-creation with other realms and the angelic realms especially. I had encountered Angels through my Catholic upbringing, also in literature, and knew of the inspiration of muses, had called on them, but this felt different. And, much more so, as I seemed to connect so easily with this Angel that had a ubiquitous influence. Subsequently as I explored more deeply, this interest morphed into appreciation and awe, and led to the angels@findhorn 2000 conference.

I found a brief mention of the birth of the Angel in one of the Findhorn books and this intrigued me, and further triggered my desire to know more. There followed some correspondence over time with Dorothy Maclean and she was kind enough to tell me the story, her story. One of the letters I have kept since Dec 1999. Inspired by this I wrote a short Play intended for perhaps a Conference or the 60th Birthday celebration but so far it remains unperformed.

I am delighted to be able to share my imaginative immersion into the birth of the Angel and my abiding gratitude to these realms and, very especially, Dorothy Maclean.

***

THE CROSS-BREED ANGEL

The Story of the Birth of The Angel of Findhorn

A PLAY

by Michael Hawkins

 

NARRATOR DOROTHY MACLEAN: There’s not much time left now … while I’m still lucid, can hold on to fleeting memories … I must talk about that high-Summer afternoon when ‘Findhorn’ first opened his/her eyes. Much has been written about the Garden but nothing much has been said about how we humans helped birth, ‘Findhorn’, the Cross Breed Angel, that … that afternoon … when he first opened his eyes.

Feeling the time was close, I had summoned them, our group of adults. I can see them, our circle, gathered, expectant, bemused. Peter, Eileen, Lena and young Iona, who had felt the awakening, and crept in to be with us. It was a too-hot-even-for-worker-bees afternoon, the smell of the Gorse bushes – tangerine/coconut, pervaded the air. There was a stillness, even though the bird-song seemed to have intensified, and there was a palpable excitement. Was Pan there, did he play his pipes? … I had summoned them, the group of adults, and we gathered around the embryonic form that we could all perceive. I felt like a midwife and, in a giddy way, a sort of human mother to Findhorn …

It’s dimming now, my memory … it comes and goes … no wait … I can see it, feel it … that moment when his eyes opened. Iona gasped, Peter was silent! … We had helped birth the first cross-breed angel … What have we done, what are we doing, I remember thinking … but then, ‘Findhorn’, one eye open, looked at me …

SCENE 1

The Findhorn Garden, 1964

Bird song, adult/children’s voices in background. A group of adults, and one girl, are focused on something on the ground. 

PETER: (Breathless). Why did you call us. Is it about to be earth-born?

IONA: (Cutting through him) Is it awakening … is it … is it …?

EILEEN: (Gently, Ssshh) Be still

DOROTHY: (Gazing lovingly) Yes, I wanted you to be here so we can help mid-wife it … Look at it lying there, its eyes are still closed, but it is stirring. It’s close now. Oh my, it’s length, reach will be great.

PETER: Is it our goodwill, thoughts and actions in this garden that are helping it form, and if so is it …?

DOROTHY: A cross-breed angel. Yes, it is a new type of angel and it gathers life from all of us.

LENA: Are we, in a sense, part of its body then? You say it’s a new sort of creature, angel, not at all like those in the bible, but it will have human characteristics, our characteristics … … (looks around group) … poor thing.

DOROTHY: Yes, we’re part of it and the Landscape Angel, my intermediary with the Devic realms, says it will act as a sensory bridge to the divine.

PETER: So we’re helping birth, here in this garden, something entirely new, something that can bridge realms, bring unity between humanity and the angelic realms, imagine that, and … it is born because of our goodwill and high ideals, and will be a kind of guardian angel for what we do here?

DOROTHY: Yes. Think of it. We’ll be able to co-operate, collaborate … (Pause) with the angelic/devic realms.

(Pause)

DOROTHY: (still gazing at the embryonic form) We give it love and it grows … it looks like a sort of sleeping beauty on the ground …

PETER: As if waiting for a prince to come and awaken her …

DOROTHY: Or him. It may not be male or female

EILEEN: Let’s send it love and warmth so we can speed up the process and quicken its growth

DOROTHY: I’m told it is growing phenomenally fast compared to others of its kind

PETER: (Impatient) Yes, yes, we must all send it love, warmth so its head can form …

DOROTHY: And its eyes open

GIRL: Will I be able to play with it? Can I call it Findy?

LENA: Oh my, here in this garden we’re co-creating with God, the devic realms … helping birth a …

PETER: A Cross-Breed Angel! Yes.

DOROTHY: We are in it, it is in us, different, yet one.

(group all look at one another)

IONA: Dorothy.. Will all the other Angels accept it because Findy will be like, … well a mongrel dog?

EILEEN: A good question Iona. It will be between worlds Dorothy. Will it be able to fit in?

PETER: (Mischevously, gingerly touches hip) Will it walk with a limp?

EILEEN: Or talk like a chimp!

IONA: Will it wear wellingtons?

DOROTHY: (Patiently). It’s a new type of Angel, a sort of prototype … though we have helped bring it into life through our willingness to co-create with the angelic realms, I can’t imagine it will have human characteristics …

IONA: Will it smell of the soil, or our compost heap? What will we feed it Dorothy, Milk?

EILEEN: Come sit with me child (Wraps Iona under her arm)

DOROTHY: No, not milk, pure love.

DOROTHY: (Inner Voice) A Cross-Breed Angel. What have we done?

SCENE TWO

Silence

(The group sit, focused, breathing, waiting)

IONA: (Whispers) It glows, like … like an amber volcano, yet I don’t feel heat and … and I … I feel happier than I have ever done … (sighs and sings) … If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands …

Do you think Findy knows we‘re here? I think she does. I’m sure she does.

(Still whispering) ... But when will its eyes open … will it be able to stand or will it slither around like a foal!

EILEEN: Sshhh, child … let’s sit quietly, patiently, sending our love.

NARRATOR DOROTHY: And then after what seemed an eternity, it stirred …

IONA: Dorothy … Dorothy …  it’s moving, it’s … it’s trying to stand

DOROTHY: (Through strangled voice) Let’s hum …

PETER: Hum? A Lullaby? Really?

DOROTHY: Yessss

IONA: Lookkkk … points … ( she gasps) Its … its eye …

NARRATOR DOROTHY: One eye had opened and was fixed on me. I barely heard the child. My heart raced though I felt a calm, a peace that passed all my understanding. Its gaze penetrated me – I felt a love that is impossible to describe. Time had ceased to exist. I wasn’t aware of the others, only the indescribably loving, new-born, eden-ancient, gaze of what we know now as the Angel of Findhorn. Even now I can see, feel that one-eyed (as much as an angel has an eye) look and be transported back to the love, grace and gratitude that poured through me that afternoon. After moments, it seemed an eternity had passed, I looked around … Iona was transfixed, Peter silent, Eileen and Lena’s eyes were closed, as they continued to send love to the cross-breed angel … … I hope they all experienced something of what I did, we never did talk about it, holding it in our hearts in all that followed. Yes … Peter’s voice … I remember hearing him as though I was far away, at the bottom of a well or on top of Jacob’s ladder …

PETER: (Whispering, urgently) It’s … it’s moving

IONA: (Hands to her face) It’s standing … and it’s tall … gasps again … now I can’t see it … head craning … where has it gone

DOROTHY: I can’t see it either, though it feels immensely tall

EILEEN: Already it has gone high, into the heart-of-all

LENA: Dorothy, Peter, Eileen, can you hear it … the angels are rejoicing … singing, for a new-born.

DOROTHY! Yes. Yes. To hear the Angels Sing. (Sigh) ... To hear them Sing …

IONA: (Tearfully) But it’s gone … I wanted to see it. Play with it. How can it help us …what will it do? She could have worn my wellingtons.

DOROTHY: (Inner Voice) I didn’t see its second eye … it was up and away like Horus the Egyptian god …

(Kindly to Iona.) It won’t need Wellingtons Iona. It’s a people angel, and will help support those who come here. It will be planting and weeding in a different way.

Group looks at each other

PETER: I’m surprised I’m saying this but … let’s be quiet and see if we can hear it, see if it can speak to us.

EILEEN: (Smiling) Quite Peter. Quite!

NARRATOR DOROTHY: And so we did. After what seemed like several summers had passed, we heard/received, the Angel of Findhorn:

ANGEL OF FINDHORN:“I take my stand with my brothers, tall and one in essence. Immensely vigorous and vital I am with a role that reaches to the four corners of the earth … and beyond. We all rejoice, in these realms that with the help of all of you has been born, and will grow to fulfilment, one such as I, a prototype of cooperative activity. I have been given sustenance by both the devic and human worlds

DOROTHY: Are you?

AOF: I am the spirit of the place, the Angel of Findhorn, and beyond

NARRATOR DOROTHY: I can’t recall what else happened that afternoon. It was late when we emerged, in silence, still awed by all we had seen and experienced. I looked up at Pine Ridge and saw the fullest Moon I had ever seen at Findhorn. Iona was asleep, cradled in Peter’s arms, no doubt somewhere with ‘Findy’.

Our cross-breed angel did in fact reach the four corners of the globe and no doubt beyond. Our garden, grown out of necessity, attracted thousands upon thousands and became much more than a garden. The Angel of Findhorn is spoken of, prayed to in Moscow, Milan, Tokyo, New York, Berlin.

As years passed I only had five messages from the Angel of Findhorn, or CB, as we adult ‘mid-wives’ lovingly referred to our cross-breed angel. I continued to receive hundreds more from the Landscape Angel … but Findhorn proved to be a ‘people angel’, the one who visitors attuned to. Perhaps it is because he/she was birthed here and is seen, felt as the spirit of the place.

So I think that is all I can recall for now … It is done … the story of the first cross-breed angel … mm, but the Angel’s story isn’t done yet … it will go on and on and on even after we have passed on, providing Findhorn is still energised, growing, needed …

SCENE THREE

2021
Field of Dreams, Findhorn

Older woman looking out of window, pensive, concerned. She clutches something. Child enters room.

CHILD/MIRIAM: Grandma … grandma … come … are, are you alright Grandma?

IONA: (still lost in thought) (Barely hears child) Yes … yes. I’m fine … fine … go, play with Zeb, I’ll come in a moment.

MIRIAM: (Stands by Iona, looks up and out of window). Grandma, is that Findy you’re holding. You’re often here … by the window … are you looking for her?

IONA: (Comes present) Yes … it is Findy I’m holding.

MIRIAM: You told me Eileen and Dorothy, I think, had made it for you … an angel toy with Findy embroidered on it … can I hold it … Can you tell me the story again?

IONA: In a moment. (Inner Voice) It’s showing signs of wear and tear but I’ll always cherish it. Lena embroidered Findy on you. Holds it, looks carefully. Yes the ‘n’ is coming loose. They made it, gave it to me to remember that … that afternoon when her eyes opened. I was the only Findhorn kid present.

MIRIAM: Grandma … You look worried. Are you looking for Findy. Trying to see her in the sky?

IONA: Yes, she’s out there but also inside me. (Touches her heart)

MIRIAM: (Looks confused)

IONA: (Kindly) Go and play with Zeb … I’ll come soon. Here. You can take Findy but be careful, her wings are coming loose

MIRIAM: (Beams. Squeals) Thank you Grandma. (Holds Findy carefully to chest.)

IONA :(Inner Voice) The child is right … I am concerned. Guests, visitors can no longer come and who knows when they will be able to. I’m concerned that Findhorn, our cross-breed angel will lose power. Its purpose was to help lift all those that come, and us, into our divine Self. It is the spirit of the place and has spanned the world, taking in the vibrations of all who come here.

Angels, guardians, the spirit of a place, often live on long after people have passed and its guardian purpose is still active … but we’re in lockdown and there’s talk of closure, redundancies. Peter, Eileen, Lena, Dorothy, Findhorn’s ‘midwifes’ have all passed. Others too. Will Findhorn still have a purpose, without visitors? Will its power ebb?
(Looks out, one hand on heart)

Findy, Where are you? …. Dorothy, Peter, Eileen, Lena, what can I do?

-ENDS-

***

Source/References

The Findhorn Garden, 1975 edition, Pages 67, 68, Dorothy Maclean.

The Findhorn Garden Story, Pps 66,67

Main Source: Letter to Michael Hawkins December 1999 from Dorothy Maclean, telling the story of the Angel of Findhorn. This was intended to help in the creation of the Angels@ Findhorn Conference 2000.

Michael’s imagination!

Photo credits: Top-drawing by Barbara Thomas – her Angel artwork was used on all formats for the Angels @ Findhorn 2000 conference and later for the book cover on Growing People by Kay Kay (published by Peter Lloyd.) Thank you Barbara for permission to use ‘the Angel’ on this website.

Angel Cloud from Internet Archive free download

Thank you!!!