Helen Lutes passed away quietly in her sleep on May 9th at 12:15 AM. She was just five months short of being 99 years old. She is survived by her husband, Charlie.

Helen was a spiritual giant. Her first spiritual experience came when she was only seven or eight years old. She was walking along with her mother and brother when a piece of candy dropped out of her mouth. She bent down to pick it up, but her mother stopped her and said, "Don't do that! God won't love you." God's love was extremely important to Helen, so that remark had a deep effect on her. That night an old man with a beard appeared to her in a vision. He put his hand on her shoulder and said, "Don't worry dear, God loves you."

Helen was born with a ken insight and an ability to see into the hearts of people. She brought into this life many talents which had been developed in previous lives. Some of these began to show up at a very early age.

When she was ten years old her aunt wanted her to demonstrate her reading skills. She handed Helen a romance novel and asked her to read it for her. After a few minutes of reading, her aunt told her she did very well. "You read just like an adult," she said. She remarked with some surprise that there were some French words in the piece, but Helen read their English meaning.

Helen always got A's in school because she wanted to please her mother. She was very popular and was head of the glee club, the swimming team and the rowing team. She also liked to ride horseback. She wanted to go on to college, but never did because her family moved to Hermosa Beach in California, where she met Charlie.

Helen has always been a very private person. It would surprise most meditators to know that she had a high society background, which she gave up when she and Charlie began to meditate. She never talked about it. She was hired by a movie studio, however, to teach the stars how to dress and behave in public. She knew a great many of the stars and W. C. Fields used to call her, "My little flower."

Helen met Charlie in an exclusive nightclub. She was having dinner with several friends and Charlie had come in to talk to the piano player about buying a car. Helen saw Charlie and sent a man over to ask him to join them for dinner. Charlie, who was not dressed for the occasion, politely refused. The man said, “Look, a young lady at our table wishes to meet you. Please don’t disappoint her.” Charlie went over and met Helen. A couple of days later he met her again. She happened to be sun bathing on the beach in front of his house. As Helen puts it, he pursued her for about two years until Helen allowed herself to be caught. They were married in June of 1940. It was her second marriage and Charlie’s first. Helen had a daughter, Katherine, by her first husband, but she died accidentally at the age of 18 months.

Both Helen and Charlie were destined to live spiritual lives. They both studied with Manly P. Hall for a time and later they were both members of the School of the Mysteries.

There have been various schools of mysteries in existence for thousands of years. Their purpose is to safeguard the higher knowledge so that it is not entirely lost to mankind. In Christ’s time the Mystery School was part of the Essenes and both Mary and Joseph belonged to it.

You cannot join a real mystery school. You are recruited. In the one that Charlie and Helen belonged to, Charlie say’s he was approached by a man on the street and asked if he would like to be a member of the School of the Mysteries. Charlie said yes and was told to be at a certain address at a certain time. The instruction was one on one rather than in a group. The teacher did not allow Charlie to ask any questions, take notes or make any recordings. He was to sit and listen and absorb as much knowledge as possible. Usually the lessons were a week apart. During the week some direct experiences would be given that pertained to the previous lesson. For instance, suppose one week the lesson was on reincarnation. A thorough discussion on reincarnation would give you a good intellectual understanding of the process. During the week you would have two or three experiences of remembering vividly one of your previous lives. These experiences would impact all of the sense, so that you could feel the heat of the day, smell the fragrances in the air, see and hear what you were doing and know what your inner reactions were, based on the level of knowledge and awareness you had in that previous life. By the time the next week’s lesson was at hand, you had a good intellectual understanding of the previous lesson as well as some practical direct experience pertaining to it. This is how Charlie explained the Mystery School to me. As I said before, Charlie and Helen both belonged to the same School of the Mysteries at the same time, but each had their own one-on-one instruction separately from each other.

Helen told me that her teacher at the Mystery School regarded Helen as the best and most advanced student they had ever had.

Maharishi told one of his Brahmacharis the following information about Helen. He wrote the information down and later gave Helen a copy of it. In 1997 she gave the information to me.

“Helen Lutes, the wife of Charles Lutes, heard Maharishi’s first lecture at the masquer’s Club in Hollywood in May of 1959. She started Transcendental Meditation two days later, when she was initiated by Maharishi.” [Helen and Charlie were the first two people initiated by Maharishi in the United States. They have been meditating 42 years.]

“After initiation, she attended the lectures and checking sessions given by the Maharishi. Checking then was on a personal one-to-one basis. At this time, she, being a housewife and having her own car, volunteered her services to help the Maharishi. From that point on, she has worked ceaselessly for the Transcendental Meditation movement. For eight years she ran the initiation program, was assistant to the treasurer and handled many personal projects for the Maharishi. For five years the only initiator in the U.S. was Buelah Smith, and Helen was her assistant. She has served as executive assistant to the president of SRM and as a member of the board of the World Plan Executive Council. In 1967 she went to India and was made a teacher of meditation. Maharishi assigned her to initiate celebrities and to personally handle any special cases needing her attention, and, throughout the years, she has helped many over the rough spots that arose in their lives. She has been a spiritual guide to literally hundreds, and is called by many, Spiritual Mother.

Through the years she has displayed unwavering loyalty and devotion to the Maharishi and to the Movement, and Maharishi says, ‘She is a life member of my personal family.’”

Both Charlie and Helen left the School of the Mysteries when Charlie was told by his Mystery School teacher that according to the hierarchy of gods on the inner planes, Maharishi has the highest spiritual teaching in creation. They have both served Maharishi since then.

Helen coordinated activities in the first Mediation Center in the country, located on 6th Street in Los Angeles. Later it became the National Center. She arranged for a certain percentage of the income from new centers to be sent to the National Center, and in the first year was able to finance Maharishi’s first world tour. She coordinated the activities of the initiators so that meditation was available where and when people wanted to start. As a result of her organizational skills, the movement began to move and Maharishi was able to establish Meditation Centers in every free country of the world. She is literally the Mother of the Movement.

Helen requested that there be no memorial service for her in Scottsdale. It remains for the hundreds of people who knew and loved her to remember her in their own way. Her great golden light has passed from this world, but not from our hearts.

The poem [Miss me but let me go] on the front of this newsletter was Helen’s favorite for occasions such as this.

Jai Guru Dev

- "Hesperides" A newsletter for the Aquarian Age. May 2001.

(Any spelling or grammatical error are from my typing and not the author.)

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