After graduating from Binghamton Univiersity of New York with a B.A. in Psychology, Christopher, beginning in 1989, studied for six years in a Yoga Ashram (The Kriplalu Center for Yoga and Health in Lenox, MA) where he received extensive training in Eastern ascetical spritual practices and received instruction in various modalities of holistic health and wellness. This resulted in his becoming a Natural Foods Chef at the Retreat Center. As part of a chefs team, he helped to run a kitchen, preparing vegetarian meals, featuring dishes from the Macrobiotic(i.e. Michio Kushi) cancer prevention diet, serving 400-600 people daily.
In 1996, in Hawaii, he co-founded Lokahi Retreat, which was established with six staff members as an interstate seminar training program that brought together staff with various expertise in Eastern and Western ascetical practices, (spiritual disciplines) to help people to learn to enter into interior stillness, in order to properly observe and participate in the Sabbath and develop their interior spiritual life in an authentic way for greater contact with the Divine Mystery.
While residing in Maui, Hawaii, he helped to establish an organic raw/live food restaurant and educational center (The Raw Experience) in Paia, assisting others to cultivate an awareness of fresh raw organic natural vegetarian food. He guided individuals in the preparation of such foods, encouraging a healthy food lifestyle for the Temple of the Holy Spirit. (The human body).
Christopher was received into the Franciscan Third order in 1999. He was Canonically professed as a Third Order brother by Father Bonaventure Bionda on July 28th, 2001 at St. Anthony's Friary in Troy, N.Y.
During his novitiate, as a Third Order Franciscan brother, he began working with disenfranchised local youth, in Maui, who had previously been violent towards foreign residents and visitors in the community due to deep anger and resentment towards the foreigner arising from years of estrangement. A movement had already been started by another Franciscan brother in the year 2000 which dissolved separation consciousness between the local youth and the foreign settler, visitor and traveler. An organization, the Third Order Knights of Lili'uokalani was formed which embodied the values of this movement. It was established as an entity of a Franciscan Third Order Fraternity.
The next two years were spent in Western Mass. Br. Christopher built two treehouse hermitages in a wilderness retreat setting, as part of his vocation and ascetical training in the Franciscan eremitical life. These were build on the same land where the first Franciscan hermitage was built in the United States in the 1970's (as opposed to friaries). The first of the two treehouse hermitages Br. Christopher built, appeared in the Boston Globe and the other was featured on Channel 5 of Boston. Br. Christopher is part of the Francsican eremitical movement which is a movement that has revived hermitages in the Franciscan family after the Second Vatican Council which mandated renewal. As a Franciscan hermit, Brother Christopher lives a form of life based on Regula Pro Eremitoriis, e.g., "St. Francis' Rule for Hermitages", that alternates between time spent in silence and solitude in prayer and time spent in activities in the service of others.
Arriving in Honolulu in 2005, Br. Christopher worked with street "youth-at-risk" in Waikiki. In 2006, he received a Makana Grant from Unity Church of Hawaii at Diamond Head to support him in his outreach effort. Returning to Maui in 2008, he has worked closely with the Native Hawaiian Community, advocating for those in need; working with those who are houseless and providing hope and assistance to purpose driven local youth.
While continuing to grow in his spiritual life, he has been called, through prayer, to help to provide assistance to the worthy poor and to reach out to Arab youth, especially who are promising pilgrims of peace for the Middle East and beyond. Brother Christopher and another Franciscan brother have endeavored to work, since 2001, with a Moslem young man from a peasant village in Morocco who is studying Christianity and represents a voice of reason and is a visionary for peace in the arab world. This arab young man, with a young family, is an example of the kind of person who people would want to support at this critical time in history.
Br. Christopher views his Jewish heritage as a Gift from G-d, to serve his Hawaiian, Arab/Moslem, Christian and Jewish brothers and sisters in a unique way during this special time in history. The importance of the time of this outreach, he believes, cannot be underestimated.
His active ministry and contemplative life focus on:
* Cultivating interior stillness in hermitages/chapels...
* Uncovering and revealing dynamics of misunderstanding and separation...
* Outreach to street youth, helping them to discover their higher purpose in life...
* Dissolving separation consciousness between and within individuals through the
example and teachings of St. Francis of Assisi and Queen Lili'uokalani.
* Directly assisting those individuals who can make a difference in the lives of others...
* Teaching people how to care for the "body temple"...
* Assisting people in the development of their interior life for greater contact with
The Divine Mystery.
Brother Christopher can be contacted at fryrchris@aol.com
http://christopherfishkinosf.blogspot.com/2011/07/blog-post.html
