Agondonters

[Bradly]

50:7.1 (578.6) On first thought it might appear that Urantia and its associated isolated worlds are most unfortunate in being deprived of the beneficent presence and influence of such superhuman personalities as a Planetary Prince and a Material Son and Daughter. But isolation of these spheres affords their races a unique opportunity for the exercise of faith and for the development of a peculiar quality of confidence in cosmic reliability which is not dependent on sight or any other material consideration. It may turn out, eventually, that mortal creatures hailing from the worlds quarantined in consequence of rebellion are extremely fortunate. We have discovered that such ascenders are very early intrusted with numerous special assignments to cosmic undertakings where unquestioned faith and sublime confidence are essential to achievement.

50:7.2 (579.1) On Jerusem the ascenders from these isolated worlds occupy a residential sector by themselves and are known as the agondonters, meaning evolutionary will creatures who can believe without seeing, persevere when isolated, and triumph over insuperable difficulties even when alone. This functional grouping of the agondonters persists throughout the ascension of the local universe and the traversal of the superuniverse; it disappears during the sojourn in Havona but promptly reappears upon the attainment of Paradise and definitely persists in the Corps of the Mortal Finality. Tabamantia is an agondonter of finaliter status, having survived from one of the quarantined spheres involved in the first rebellion ever to take place in the universes of time and space.

50:7.3 (579.2) All through the Paradise career, reward follows effort as the result of causes. Such rewards set off the individual from the average, provide a differential of creature experience, and contribute to the versatility of ultimate performances in the collective body of the finaliters.

I wonder, based on the description above, who exactly is determined eligible for this designation? For example, there are two groups who come to mind.

First, are those from isolated worlds who may survive mortality to arrive on the Mansion worlds but were not faith, love, or service motivated during their mortal life.

Second, are those from worlds that were isolated once upon a time but are born in a later era, nearer light and life in the mortal epochs when the Teacher/Bestowal ministries have restored order and re-established planetary rule so that world is no longer isolated.

It would appear to me that not all who survive mortality without either example or faith might not meet the standards described and neither would those from a once-isolated world who are born into a later mortal-epoch. I wonder if even those rare worlds who suffer the effects of rebellion might only produce agondonters during very specific times within the planetary epochs?

I don’t find the topic particularly important but it has delivered some interest and speculation to my mind. It seems that no suffering of anyone who finds faith and love goes without some potential for “reward” and greater service due to such mortal suffering.

Simply curious…and open to the conjectures of others….and any related text to consider. The gift of heaven is certainly “reward” enough for this tadpole!! But nice to know that the Supreme and the eternal adventure to come finds use for such tadpoles who find God and faith and loving service on such worlds as our own.

Thanks!! = )
Bradly

PS Another group I wonder about are the Prince’s staff and the Loyal Midwayers who were on planet and remained loyal and, also, the celestials in a System that fall into rebellion. Are they not also rebellion-tested? Since the Corps of Finality includes many forms of ascendant children from time and space, I would assume that such an experience in loyalty and faith might also find such celestials working alongside Agondonters or even might become such or some similar standing of faith-children.

[Moderator-1]

Dear Bradly,

Your topic, Agondonters, landed in the spam folder yesterday.  I found it there and moved it here today.  Sorry about the glitch.

Moderator-1

[Mara]

Bradly wrote:

First, are those from isolated worlds who may survive mortality to arrive on the Mansion worlds but were not faith, love, or service motivated during their mortal life.

Even a flicker of faith is honored by our all-merciful Creator.  If those with the faintest flicker get to Mansonia, they will have to rehabilitate.  Many of us will have to rehabilitate and make up for our deficiencies as we go along in Mansonia.

155:6.17[Part IV]

Now, mistake not, my Father will ever respond to the faintest flicker of faith. He takes note of the physical and superstitious emotions of the primitive man. And with those honest but fearful souls whose faith is so weak that it amounts to little more than an intellectual conformity to a passive attitude of assent to religions of authority, the Father is ever alert to honor and foster even all such feeble attempts to reach out for him. But you who have been called out of darkness into the light are expected to believe with a whole heart; your faith shall dominate the combined attitudes of body, mind, and spirit.

Do you think the *amount* of faith, love or service  motivation determines whether or not an individual is denominated agondonter?  I’m inclined to think the determiner is whether or not the individual hails from an isolated planet, rather than *amount* of faith, etc.

Bradly wrote:

. . . but are born in a later era, nearer light and life in the mortal epochs when the Teacher/Bestowal ministries have restored order and re-established planetary rule so that world is no longer isolated.

Your scenario pertains to the distant future when Satania is readmitted into the constellation of Norlatiadek.

46:8.1[Part II]

The purely local and routine affairs of Jerusem are directed from the one hundred triangles. These units are clustered around the ten marvelous structures domiciling the local administration of Jerusem. The triangles are surrounded by the panoramic depiction of the system headquarters history. At present there is an erasure of over two standard miles in this circular story. This sector will be restored upon the readmission of Satania into the constellation family. Every provision for this event has been made by the decrees of Michael, but the tribunal of the Ancients of Days has not yet finished the adjudication of the affairs of the Lucifer rebellion. Satania may not come back into the full fellowship of Norlatiadek so long as it harbors archrebels, high created beings who have fallen from light into darkness.

And . . .

46:8.2[Part II]

When Satania can return to the constellation fold, then will come up for consideration the readmission of the isolated worlds into the system family of inhabited planets, accompanied by their restoration to the spiritual communion of the realms. But even if Urantia were restored to the system circuits, you would still be embarrassed by the fact that your whole system rests under a Norlatiadek quarantine partially segregating it from all other systems.

Right now the two standard miles of the panoramic depiction of system HQ history is erased. They plan to restore it along with the readmission of the isolated worlds and reestablishment of the Satania circuits, “and again will such worlds enjoy the privileges of interplanetary communication and intersystem communion.” (46:8.3) Do I think that when these worlds are no longer isolated our supervisors won’t need the term *agondonters* any more?  I’m not sure. There certainly is something to be said about being rebellion-tested!

[George Park]

Bradly wrote:

I wonder, based on the description above, who exactly is determined eligible for this designation?

I suspect this designation applies to all mortals who find faith, in spite of the absence of visible superhuman personalities on a planet. We assume that to have faith is to be one of those “who can believe without seeing,” one who believes in God based upon spirit insight alone and without the benefit of visible evidence or logical, rational, or material proofs. It seems that finding God in this way is unusual and leaves a profound and indelible experiential mark. Those who come from normal worlds, where immortal superhuman personalities visibly guide and influence mortal affairs over the ages, apparently can never fully understand what it means to discover faith on a dark world seemingly abandoned by God.

It seems to me that to have any belief at all in God, to have even a flicker of faith, when confronted with all of the doubts, deceptions, cruelties and confusion present in the life is enough of a miracle to justify the designation of agondonter.

[Gene]

The overtones of such a designation sounds like work to me.

[Bonita]

George and Gene are right.  The issue is faith.  It is easy to have faith when you have tangible confirmation of a spiritual level of reality.  For those of us who have inconcussible faith in spirit without anything at all to prove its reality except an internal experience that cannot be described or explained, are part of something exceptionally unique and powerful.  The ability to have such faith in isolation and in the absence of anything at all to grasp and hold onto except the “wisp of wind” we feel as spirit, is prodigious.  No doubt the universe will use such talent in useful service.  Looking forward to helping any way I can.

[Bradly]

Thanks everyone!!

Worldwide polls show some interesting statistics….wish they could be measured before the Son’s Spirit was released!

In the USA, the number who claim to believe in God remains over 90% by those who have been polling since 1942.  There are countries which poll even higher (these are not Christian polls or limited to Christianity).  Many believe in a single source of creation and guidance within but by many different names, etc.  and also in life after death in some form or another.  Paganism seems mostly to have disappeared, even among many so-called primitive groups.  Totemism seems to be more of a cultural representation of true internal spirituality than actual beliefs in the worship of objects or animals, etc.

Oddly, to me anyway, Western Europe has one of the lowest percentages of believers….but those numbers are complicated by “church” rejection expressed as self described atheism…although altruism, ethics, morality, kindness, and love receive far higher polling numbers as “important” personal beliefs.  Those who claim not to believe in God but then climb the ladder of the Golden Rule and give love to others and serve others in self forgetting ways…is this not also a response to the Spirit?  A flicker?  And do those who claim no belief yet hope for more than they believe?

Apologies to all my Catholic friends but heard a very funny quote recently….a native of India was discussing religiosity and declared that there are no atheists in India….”…well, unless they attended Catholic school.”  He chuckled at his joke which was made in jest but not without some irony in his humor.

Although not my original topic, I wonder how profoundly and universally the Son’s Spirit has transformed the inner life of our planet’s population?   Consider no Prince’s HQ and Staff and no Garden as planetary ministries of example, leadership, education, science, culture, art, etc.  Yet in but 2000 years (truly an instant compared to all prior time of mortal habitation and mind on our world) well over 75% of our world shares this inner light of confirmation and leading whisper of belief in God by personal declaration of such belief.

An amazing force and influence with an incredible result in such a very short period of time.  Consider this in light of the scientific progress over the past 5 centuries along with literacy rates and now instant global communication and access to all human knowledge in an instant shared by so many and soon by all I think.  People are now empowered to share this common belief and this light of truth within us all.

While there is so much yet to improve materially and ethically, I think the world grows into a more caring, sharing, and loving place because of the power of the Son’s Spirit of Truth.  I wonder what our world would look like today if our Creator Son had not chosen this world to finalize his bestowal missions and bring this great gift to us?  Incomprehensible I know, for those with this Spirit cannot even begin to conceptualize life without such a ministry of love and truth who speaks to every mind and every generation.

Thanks be to God!  = )

 

[Bonita]

Bradly wrote:

In the USA, the number who claim to believe in God remains over 90% by those who have been polling since 1942.  There are countries which poll even higher (these are not Christian polls or limited to Christianity).  Many believe in a single source of creation and guidance within but by many different names, etc.  and also in life after death in some form or another.  Paganism seems mostly to have disappeared, even among many so-called primitive groups.  Totemism seems to be more of a cultural representation of true internal spirituality than actual beliefs in the worship of objects or animals, etc.

Agondondership has nothing to do with belief.  It’s about faith.  It’s not easy to poll faith.

And I’m not sure that paganism is on the wane. Witness the sudden rise of the Church of Climate Change which worships mother earth (the largest totem in existence); and, the public worship of female body parts (worn as hats), not dissimilar to Hindu linga/yoni worship. Just sayin’

[Gene]

Bradley says:

“Those who claim not to believe in God but then climb the ladder of the Golden Rule and give love to others and serve others in self forgetting ways…is this not also a response to the Spirit? A flicker? And do those who claim no belief yet hope for more than they believe?”

Secular interpretations of the Golden Rule has always been oxymoronish to me but your making me reconsider.

Its similar to the atheist who denies God but misses the thought that there must be something to deny.

so the question happens: what constitutes belief? Do we need to say it, preach it, otherwise put it into words or maybe just do it even if we “think” that we don’t believe???

its always been a puzzler to me but I do believe our adjusters know the answer.

great topic, thx.

[Bonita]

Bradly wrote:

Oddly, to me anyway, Western Europe has one of the lowest percentages of believers….but those numbers are complicated by “church” rejection expressed as self described atheism…although altruism, ethics, morality, kindness, and love receive far higher polling numbers as “important” personal beliefs.  Those who claim not to believe in God but then climb the ladder of the Golden Rule and give love to others and serve others in self forgetting ways…is this not also a response to the Spirit?  A flicker?  And do those who claim no belief yet hope for more than they believe?

Climbing the ladder of the Golden Rule without God is simply the “kingdom of good”.  It’s humanism grafted onto the true tree.  But it cannot produce spiritual fruit, only social fruit . . .  close but no cigar . . . NO SURVIVAL VALUE.

p40:4 2:5.12 When man loses sight of the love of a personal God, the kingdom of God becomes merely the kingdom of good. Notwithstanding the infinite unity of the divine nature, love is the dominant characteristic of all God’s personal dealings with his creatures.

102:7.4    True, many apparently religious traits can grow out of nonreligious roots. Man can, intellectually, deny God and yet be morally good, loyal, filial, honest, and even idealistic. Man may graft many purely humanistic branches onto his basic spiritual nature and thus apparently prove his contentions in behalf of a godless religion, but such an experience is devoid of survival values, God-knowingness and God-ascension. In such a mortal experience only social fruits are forthcoming, not spiritual. The graft determines the nature of the fruit, notwithstanding that the living sustenance is drawn from the roots of original divine endowment of both mind and spirit.

[Gene]

Climbing the ladder of the Golden Rule without God is simply the “kingdom of good”. It’s humanism grafted onto the true tree. But it cannot produce spiritual fruit, only social fruit . . . close but no cigar . . . NO SURVIVAL VALUE.

Reality check, thank you – got to keep this in mind, secular interpretations of golden rule are oxymoronish even if it sounds good to be otherwise.

[Bradly]

All very interesting.  My understanding of faith obviously needs more work.  As faith brings progress in the Spirit and mere knowledge or belief does not, false beliefs with faith are more fruitful than true beliefs/knowledge which deliver no faith.  Faith is an expression, an act.  It is that which motivates our intentions expressed by our choices.

I may believe in brakes and have knowledge of their mechanical function…but until this belief compels me to push that pedal I have no brakes!!

There is much text on faith to consider.  But we might also consider that love itself can become realized and expressed and it has but one source…and one function.  Do those who give love to others have faith?  Is some knowledge or belief required for faith to be real and realized?  Love is a specific form of universe reality that can be embraced.

I think it a false argument to say that love response and selfless love given to others is “secular” or “ethical” or “moral” as is the lowest rung of the Golden Rule…a self serving ethic of “do unto others as you wish to be done to you”.  The  lowest rungs of this ladder are not “love” in origin or expression.

I find the issue perplexing….and somehow comforting.  If one were to claim that faith in God is specifically defined by knowledge and understanding and then determines spiritual progress and destiny, I think we risk limiting the power of love itself to transform the soul and light the flicker and flames of faith itself.

One may claim a belief in God…and yet few if any choices reflect such a belief…this is not faith – the expression of belief.

One may claim no belief in God….and yet respond to love and serve others in love without belief….is this faith?

Can the soul and the Supreme not respond to the reception and transfer flow of love?

As you can see, I have more questions than assertions to share here.  Thanks for your consideration and sharing!

[Bonita]

Bradly wrote:  But we might also consider that love itself can become realized and expressed and it has but one source…and one function.

How are you defining the word love?  It’s my assertion that the word love, as defined by humans, has so many different meanings that the word by itself is essentially useless. And I would disagree that all those definitions are from the same source with the same function.  I think the word love would be better served if adjectives such as selfless, or unconditional are used to qualify it.  People tend to call all sorts of things acts of love but only God knows if they really are since only God knows true intentions.

 

 

[Bradly]

Yes Bonita…I understand and acknowledge all the mortal distortions of the word…I am specifically speaking/asking about the form of love that is Divine in origin and expressed unconditionally and selflessly or self-forgetting….when someone else is more important in personal motive, intent, choice, and act….not self important or self serving.  The form of love presented in the Papers.  Perhaps I should have been more specific and less presumptive…my bad.

True love, as described in the UB, is of one source and one function (IMO) and must be given to be truly received.  And so it is, by many.  And so it is by some without belief, knowledge, or proclamation of “faith” (again, only IMO).

So what then?  How are love and faith similar and/or connected and/or expressions of truth, beauty, and goodness?

What is the source and value and result in wanting to help others without regard to self?  Is faith only a belief which results in act and choice?  Must I believe in something/someone first to demonstrate faith?  What is the function of love in its glorious and universal circuit?  Is it not God expressing God to all creation?  And if a mortal mind participates in its expression and completes its circuit, is that a form of faith?  Does not such love, regardless of knowledge or belief, add to soul and Supreme with eternal repercussion and effect?

Does faith require something or someone as its focus of belief or knowledge?  Or might one grow in hope and faith through the ministry of God’s circuit of pure love?  I’m thinking that love is a gift that can give birth and growth to soul with the potential for great spiritual transformation and progress….no matter what one professes to know or believe…and no matter how wrong we might be in those professions of knowledge and belief.

Is selfless and self forgetting love a form of the “flicker”?

I appreciate the clarification needed and given.  Thank you.

[Bonita]

Bradly wrote:  One may claim no belief in God….and yet respond to love and serve others in love without belief….is this faith?

I don’t think so. Faith requires recognizing sonship, and sonship doesn’t come without recognizing one’s Father.

I still think your use of the word love is referring to human things like charity, pity, sympathy and empathy . . . all good things, but just shy of the ideal value of fatherly love. Faith has to do with ideal values that are not always clearly identifiable since they are supermaterial.  Faith is married to hope and certainty that there are things of such high value that exist despite obvious evidence, and in the face of sometimes overwhelming evidence to the contrary.  It’s a type of certainty of the existence of another level of personal reality without having anything other than a sense or feeling to go by.   As the supermaterial soul grows, this level of reality becomes undeniable, but still unprovable, and hence maintained by faith alone.  We are faith-sons.  With emphasis on the word sons.

99:5.8 That faith is concerned only with the grasp of ideal values is shown by the New Testament definition which declares that faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.

 

[Author]

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