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Newsletter 28: Sunday 13 July 2025Anthroposophy in Hawkes BayCalendar of Coming Events In the Rudolf Steiner Centre, 401 Whitehead Road, Hastings unless stated otherwise.
David Urieli has offered to continue speaking on the theme he started at the Festival for the Dead - the journey of human souls after death. Things are busy for David at the moment, so he will only be able to do this in August We will have a Memorial Evening for Daniel Brent where those who knew can share and celebrate his life, Date yet to be set. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- Regular GroupsLeaders of Regular Study Groups are invited to list what your group is doing, when and where and how those interested can join you. Details to info@anthrohb.nz
~~~~~ List of Members From time-to-time people request a list of members. This is purposefully not published on our website. A list of Members with email and phone contacts is available as an Excel file to paid-up Members who make a request to the Treasurer, treas@anthrohb.nz . Not every member is on the list as some members have requested that their name not appear. ~~~~~ Kathy AllanTherapeutic Pastel Class with Kathy This term we will be working with Wagner's Opera of Parzival in story form. Each week we will have a guided colour meditation from the tale. Working from the wisdom of Liane Collot d’Herbois with “Light, Colour and Darkness". Time…Wednesdays 10 -11.30am Place…Rudolf Steiner Centre Art Room Materials…Mangyo pastels and paper (bulky newsprint) can be purchased at Humanity Book. Phone Kathy on 0272330970 if you are interested.
AccommodationThe Rangimarie Flat at 617 Heretaunga Street East is now ready for a tenant. If you know of anyone who may be interested in sharing our house and gardens, please ask them to contact Lesley Waite at 021 065 8065 or Corrie Molenaar at 027 368 0242 ~~~~~ In Which Social Realm do various activities belong?Volker writes: “I want to thank you for trying to make threefold social order more accessible with your contributions. You write in latest edition [NL 27-25]: “The Legal Realm is also 3fold. In the Courts we seek justice by asking for “The Truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. In Parliament (house of representatives) we seek to create laws that are fair, and thus beautiful. In Government (including local government) we seek the provision (namely key appointments and financing) of good civil services, such as Police, Defence (Army, Navy, Airforce), Health/Hospitals, Transport infrastructure (roads, rail, ports and airports), Education (schools and universities) – that is: services that improve the lives and circumstances of the region’s citizens.” I doubt that transport infrastructure belongs into Rights Sphere and suggest it to be in Economic Sphere. Transport basically is an economic activity. I strongly disagree with health and education belonging to Rights Sphere. They certainly belong to Cultural Sphere. Health: The cultural sphere encompasses areas related to personal and community well-being, including health care. This sphere promotes individual freedom and creativity in health practices. Education: Education is also part of the cultural sphere. It focuses on nurturing individual capacities and fostering personal development. Steiner emphasized that educational institutions should operate independently from government and economic influences. The Rights Sphere cannot and must not provide "services that improve the lives and circumstances of the region’s citizens". It can only try to make sure that agreements in respect of these aims are upheld. The activities covered in these agreements themselves are part of economic or cultural spheres. Just my two cents. Best wishes, Volker” It is hard to unravel, I agree. One part of Government is in the Political-Legal Realm and another part in the Economic Realm. The part that is in the Political-Legal Realm is the organisation of Prime Minister who gets the warrant from the Governor General, as Leader of the Registered Political Party winning the triennial election, to form the Government Executive. He or she appoints Ministers of the Crown who form the Cabinet. Below that is the Caucus of Party MPs and then the non-elected leadership of the Party forming the Government. The Executive role is to pass empowering legislation (statutes) to bring their election Manifesto into being, by making appointments of key Civil Servants, agreements and contracts for the economic aspect of their manifesto. The part that is in the Economic Realm consists of the Government Departments which are led by the various Ministers working with Heads of Department to ensure the economic processes proceed.. The Political-Legal activity of the Government which needs the approval of Parliament is the collective Budget of Taxation and Expenditure and assigned tasks which are administered by the government Departments. Mostly these tasks are the provision of economic services and infrastructure. Let’s take an example: Education. Education is basically a cultural activity. But look at the organisation of a school and you will see aspects belonging to all three realms. The provision of school buildings, furniture, stationery supplies, electricity, etc. are economic activities. The organisation of timetable, staff, rosters, meetings, tasks, salaries, etc. belong to the Rights Realm where conversations and agreements in meetings are key. In the Cultural Realm are the learning activities of the individual students and the lesson preparation and study of the individual Teachers. The provision of the actual lesson in the classroom according to a timetable is actually a Service and so comes under the umbrella of Economic Community Realm. If you analyse any business, the Health service and so on, you will see they stretch over all three realms, not just one. For comparison, in the human being the Nervous System and Sense organs are mainly in the head, but extend to every part of the body. Blood (oxygen) goes to every part of the body. Nutrition goes to every part of the body. But if digestive processes become active in the brain one gets a headache, but is no problem if it takes place in the stomach. I think you will find that some/many of our social ills arise when the wrong principles are applied (maybe by force). A few years ago, for example, the Government's management of the Covid pandemic caused considerable social strife. On the one hand, the Governmental provision of vaccines [if adequately tested] freely and equitably available to all citizens is an appropriate service. The actual consumption of medicines should be the free choice of all adults, but denying citizens/people the right to work for choosing not to avail themselves of the vaccine was not a mandate (in its manifesto) of the Government. As Sergei O. Prokofieff writes ‘All the catastrophic wars and crises taking place in the world today are, in the last resort, only the outer expression of the inner battles of us human beings, and the scene of action is in our hearts.’ Threefold society, as Rudolf Steiner describes it, is a reflection of the threefold nature of the human beings who create it. Human beings become ill when processes occur in the wrong place. In these musings, I am searching for social processes that are right in one place but not where they are currently happening thus creating social ills. ~~~~~ New Zealand once had two chambers of Parliament (bicameral - before 1951): an Upper House (Legislative Council – ‘Honourable’ members appointed by the Governor General) which checked and approved legislation passed by the Lower House; In the first NZ election in 1853, there were 24 electorates with 37 representatives. Some electorates had multiple representatives, like Wellington and Auckland with three each. Today, Parliament has a total of 72 electorates. These are made up of 65 general electorates and 7 Māori electorates. Each electorate represents a specific geographic area and voters in that area elect a Member of Parliament (MP) to represent them. In addition there are 48 Party seats to make a total of 120 seats in Parliament. Our Electoral system now is Mixed Member Proportional, MMP. It is interesting that it takes a super majority of 75% to change the electoral system – it is well entrenched. While MMP produces party proportionality, it also incorporates an element of constituency representation by requiring that over half the members of Parliament be elected directly in single-member electoral districts, on an FPP [simple majority – First Past the Post] basis. Each voter has two votes: one for an individual member to represent their electoral district (candidates declare their membership of a particular Party), and the other for a registered Political Party. Once the electorate members are decided, the membership of the House is topped up with candidates drawn from the Party Lists to produce overall proportionality based on the party vote. A threshold of 5 percent of the party vote, or having an individual candidate elected from an electoral district, must be met before a party is entitled to seats in the House. This threshold prevents the representation of a large number of very small parties in the House. This effectively means Government is run by Party Rule. Party whips ensure that MPs vote on legislation according to the Party’s manifesto. Any MP can introduce legislation to the House. Mostly bills are introduced by Government Ministers to enact their Party manifesto. MPs can introduce private bills – for example, our local Tukituki MP, Catherine Wedd, currently has a bill before parliament that will restrict social media access for individuals under 16. Jenny Shipley, a former prime minister remarked, “I have often thought Parliament is at its best when people have to stand up and convince each other of the relative merits of an argument. It is appropriate that issues of conscience [should] depend on the quality of the debate.” This view was echoed by another MP who felt that conscience voting engendered a greater rigour in debates as a result of individual perspectives being freed from having to ‘toe the party line.’ Where WE need to be vigilant is when Party Whips effectively and inappropriately prevent an MP making a conscience vote on behalf of their electorate. Do individual MPs have good systems for ascertaining the ‘will’ of the voters they represent? Regardless of which Party you vote for, the Candidate who obtains a simple majority [FPP] becomes your representative and may be a member of a different party with a different agenda. Again, take the Tukituki Electorate. It has a population of about 73,500 (2017 census) of whom 63,400 are of voting age. In the 2023 election Catherine Wedd won comfortably with just over 19,000 votes = 26% of the population [a super minority]. Another way of looking at this is that 74% of the population did not vote for her. She has to represent that 74%, as necessary, in parliament despite that disconnect. MPs need to be quite special people! Other questions: Should being an MP be a long-term career? Or a limited time of so many terms, allowing fresh representation? In the USA the President is limited to two 4-year terms. Another interesting USA variation is different electoral terms. House of Representatives has elections every 2 years (whereas Senators have a six-year term). In New Zealand the 3-year term has the effect that of creating chaos and change for many months around election time. What would 2 years be like? The USA House has 435 members not by State – Hawaii has 1, while California has 52! – so there would be frequent change in membership and new people learning the ropes. Each member represents a congressional district of about 750,000 people - about 10 times the size of our electorates! Each of the 50 States [regardless of size] is represented by two senators who serve staggered six-year terms, which give more stability at election time and allows each senator to gain experience in the role. The Senate is considered a more deliberative and prestigious body than the House due to its longer terms and smaller size. How well does our political system serve us? Do we need change? RB Next week: Right - Centre - Left in politics as 3fold?
Posted: Sun 13 Jul 2025 |
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