-
Posts
-
What a beautiful presentation of this paper! Feel I’ve been transported; better yet the past is brought into my presence – here and now. It gives me great hope for the current generation that seemingly shuns cyrstalized rituals of religion, abhors the misuse of technical advancements and realizes the ineptness of politico-economic policies as are currently practice. They seemingly have a grip on service motive – which consciously or unconconsciously will move us ever slowly away from the materialistic grip of the profit motive. They are compassionate and educated. Their personal morality appears to be the step in uprooting the ethics of materialistic-humanism. Even the leader of the Catholic church is attempting to shine light on the virtues of humility. Nice to put this into context with Rick’s expose. Peace be unto you, especially in thanksgiving for our continuing evolutionary progress.
Good to see you and your thoughtful comments here, rgardini. Agree, there is much hope and potential in the current generation. Let us grow.
Richard E Warren
Welcome to The OPAD Online Study Session
Today’s Presentation
Paper 195 – AFTER PENTECOST
5. The Modern Problem
The twentieth century has brought new problems for Christianity and all other religions to solve. The higher a civilization climbs, the more necessitous becomes the duty to “seek first the realities of heaven” in all of man’s efforts to stabilize society and facilitate the solution of its material problems.
(2075.5)195:5.2 Truth often becomes confusing and even misleading when it is dismembered, segregated, isolated, and too much analyzed. Living truth teaches the truth seeker aright only when it is embraced in wholeness and as a living spiritual reality, not as a fact of material science or an inspiration of intervening art.
(2075.6)195:5.3 Religion is the revelation to man of his divine and eternal destiny. Religion is a purely personal and spiritual experience and must forever be distinguished from man’s other high forms of thought, such as:
1. Man’s logical attitude toward the things of material reality.
2. Man’s aesthetic appreciation of beauty contrasted with ugliness.
3. Man’s ethical recognition of social obligations and political duty.
4. Even man’s sense of human morality is not, in and of itself, religious.
(2075.11)195:5.8 Religion is designed to find those values in the universe which call forth faith, trust, and assurance; religion culminates in worship. Religion discovers for the soul those supreme values which are in contrast with the relative values discovered by the mind. Such superhuman insight can be had only through genuine religious experience.
(2075.12)195:5.9 A lasting social system without a morality predicated on spiritual realities can no more be maintained than could the solar system without gravity.
(2076.1)195:5.10 Do not try to satisfy the curiosity or gratify all the latent adventure surging within the soul in one short life in the flesh. Be patient! be not tempted to indulge in a lawless plunge into cheap and sordid adventure. Harness your energies and bridle your passions; be calm while you await the majestic unfolding of an endless career of progressive adventure and thrilling discovery.
(2076.2)195:5.11 In confusion over man’s origin, do not lose sight of his eternal destiny. Forget not that Jesus loved even little children, and that he forever made clear the great worth of human personality.
(2076.3)195:5.12 As you view the world, remember that the black patches of evil which you see are shown against a white background of ultimate good. You do not view merely white patches of good which show up miserably against a black background of evil.
(2076.4)195:5.13 When there is so much good truth to publish and proclaim, why should men dwell so much upon the evil in the world just because it appears to be a fact? The beauties of the spiritual values of truth are more pleasurable and uplifting than is the phenomenon of evil.
(2076.5)195:5.14 In religion, Jesus advocated and followed the method of experience, even as modern science pursues the technique of experiment. We find God through the leadings of spiritual insight, but we approach this insight of the soul through the love of the beautiful, the pursuit of truth, loyalty to duty, and the worship of divine goodness. But of all these values, love is the true guide to real insight.
***
[Each OPAD presentation is copied from The Urantia Book published by Urantia Foundation. Questions and comments related to the Paper under discussion are welcome and encouraged. In-depth questions and related topics may be studied in branch threads in the OPAD, or other subforums, as you require. Thank you for studying with us.]
Richard E Warren
.
Good day rgardini, nelsong, Keryn, Rick B, Brad, Bonita, Alina, Carolyn, Carola, Fellow Students, Forum Friends, Members and Guests,
Already our new revelation is showing its age. From the first line of today’s OPAD:
…The twentieth century has brought new problems for Christianity and all other religions to solve…. (2075.4)195:5.1
We can ask: Does 21st century Christianity still have the same problems? Are they bigger? Are they different? Are they being solved in any measure?
The words in quotes in the second sentence of today’s reading:
“…seek first the realities of heaven” in all of man’s efforts to stabilize society and facilitate the solution of its material problems….(2075.5)195:5.2
…were borrowed and paraphrased from Matthew 6:33 But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.
…or possibly taken from Luke 12:
31 But rather seek ye the kingdom of God; and all these things shall be added unto you.
***
So many times the authors refer to “living truth”. From today’s reading:
…Living truth teaches the truth seeker aright only when it is embraced in wholeness and as a living spiritual reality, not as a fact of material science or an inspiration of intervening art….(2075.5)195:5.2
Other references to living truth:
…Man rejoices in the goodness of God, Havoners exult in the divine beauty, while you both enjoy the ministry of the liberty of living truth…. (157.5) 14:4.13
…I am the hope of all who know the living truth…. (1965.17) 182:1.23
…In the Trinity Teacher Sons the love, mercy, and ministry of the three Paradise Deities are co-ordinated on the highest time-space value-levels and are presented to the universes as living truth, divine goodness, and true spiritual beauty…. (232:6) 20:10.4
…The seed of theoretical truth is dead, the highest moral concepts without effect, unless and until the divine Spirit breathes upon the forms of truth and quickens the formulas of righteousness…. (380:7) 34:6.6
…Static truth is dead truth, and only dead truth can be held as a theory. Living truth is dynamic and can enjoy only an experiential existence in the human mind…. (1949:4) 180:5.2
…Truth, fact, and relationship are intellectually inseparable and associated with the philosophic concepts of beauty. Goodness, righteousness, and justice are philosophically interrelated and spiritually bound up together with living truth and divine beauty…. (507:3) 44:7.2
…The unity of truth, beauty, and goodness can only be realized in the spiritual experience of the God-knowing personality…. (2095-8) 196:3.24
…Humor also functions to lessen the shock of the unexpected impact of fact or of truth, rigid unyielding fact and flexible ever-living truth. The mortal personality, never sure as to which will next be encountered, through humor swiftly grasps–sees the point and achieves insight–the unexpected nature of the situation be it fact or be it truth…. (549:5) 48:4.18
“…Be not deceived by their show of much learning and by their profound loyalty to the forms of religion. Be only concerned with the spirit of living truth and the power of true religion….” (1745:1) 157:2.2
“…If you would guide others into the kingdom, you must yourselves walk in the clear light of living truth….” (1571:5) 140:3.18
…Although both science and philosophy may assume the probability of God by their reason and logic, only the personal religious experience of a spirit-led man can affirm the certainty of such a supreme and personal Deity. By the technique of such an incarnation of living truth the philosophic hypothesis of the probability of God becomes a religious reality…. (1140:1) 103:8.1
…All static, dead, concepts are potentially evil. The finite shadow of relative and living truth is continually moving…. (1436:1) 130:4.15
“…In your lives overthrow error and overcome evil by the love of the living truth. In all your relations with men do good for evil….” (1443:3) 131:1.7
“…Lead men into the kingdom, and the great and living truths of the kingdom will presently drive out all serious error. When you have presented to mortal man the good news that God is his Father, you can the easier persuade him that he is in reality a son of God….” (1592:4) 141:6.2
…This gospel of the kingdom is a living truth…. (1931:6) 178:1.15
“…I have brought the kingdom of heaven to you here on earth, but I declare that all of you who by faith enter therein and remain therein by the living service of truth, shall surely ascend to the worlds on high and sit with me in the spirit kingdom of our Father…. (1934:6) 178:3.4
“…I have revealed God as your Father in heaven; I have revealed you as the sons of God on earth. It is a fact that God loves you, his sons. By faith in my word this fact becomes an eternal and living truth in your hearts….” (2052:3) 193:0.3
“…And when the Father shall approve, I will pour out the Spirit of Truth upon all flesh. Already is my Father’s spirit in your hearts, and when this day shall come, you will also have me with you even as you now have the Father. This new gift is the spirit of living truth….” (1948:2) 180:4.1
…The God-knowing individual is constantly elevating wisdom to the living-truth levels of divine attainment; the spiritually unprogressive soul is all the while dragging the living truth down to the dead levels of wisdom and to the domain of mere exalted knowledge…. (1949:6) 180:5.4
…Knowledge pertains to things observed, but truth transcends such purely material levels in that it consorts with wisdom and embraces such imponderables as human experience, even spiritual and living realities…. (1459:2) 132:3.2
“…Dedicate your life to the great work of showing how the critical material mind of man can triumph over the inertia of intellectual doubting when faced by the demonstration of the manifestation of living truth as it operates in the experience of spirit-born men and women who yield the fruits of the spirit in their lives, and who love one another, even as I have loved you….” (1961:5) 181:2.26
“…You will serve mankind with a new and amazing devotion, even as I have served you. And when men see you so love them, and when they behold how fervently you serve them, they will perceive that you have become faith-fellows of the kingdom of heaven, and they will follow after the Spirit of Truth which they see in your lives, to the finding of eternal salvation….” (2044:3) 191:6.2
…Truth often becomes confusing and even misleading when it is dismembered, segregated, isolated, and too much analyzed. Living truth teaches the truth seeker aright only when it is embraced in wholeness and as a living spiritual reality, not as a fact of material science or an inspiration of intervening art…. (2075:5) 195:5.2
***
One of Christianity’s problems is its failure to grasp and live out the meaning of true religion. The Midwayers suggest real religion is above and beyond mere logic, even though religious thought and philosophical evolution is logical. It may involve beauty, but beauty is not necessarily religious. Religion may inspire the highest social and political ideals, but they are not its main focus. And morals do not a religion make, albeit real religion fosters the highest type of morality.
The Midwayers define religion several ways in today’s text:
…Religion is designed to find those values in the universe which call forth faith, trust, and assurance; religion culminates in worship…. (2075.11)195:5.8
There are many other statements about evolved and true religion:
…True religion–the religion of revelation. The revelation of supernatural values, a partial insight into eternal realities, a glimpse of the goodness and beauty of the infinite character of the Father in heaven–the religion of the spirit as demonstrated in human experience…. (1728:7) 155:5.5
…Evolutionary religion pictures the circuitous gropings of humanity in quest of truth; revelatory religion is that very truth…. (1007:3) 92:4.3
“…It is not the purpose of true religion merely to bring peace but rather to insure progress. And there can be no peace in the heart or progress in the mind unless you fall wholeheartedly in love with truth, the ideals of eternal realities….” (1745:1) 157:2.2
…True religion must ever be, at one and the same time, the eternal foundation and the guiding star of all enduring civilizations…. (1013:10) 92:7.15
…True religion has reference to destiny and reality of attainment as well as to the reality and idealism of that which is wholeheartedly faith-accepted. And all of this must be made personal to us by the revelation of the Spirit of Truth…. (1782:4) 160:5.13
…Religion reaches out for undiscovered ideals, unexplored realities, superhuman values, divine wisdom, and true spirit attainment. True religion does all of this; all other beliefs are not worthy of the name…. (1781.1) 160:5.5
…But true religion is alive. Intellectual crystallization of religious concepts is the equivalent of spiritual death. You cannot conceive of religion without ideas, but when religion once becomes reduced only to an idea, it is no longer religion; it has become merely a species of human philosophy…. (1120.4) 102:2.7
…But true religion is a living love, a life of service. The religionist’s detachment from much that is purely temporal and trivial never leads to social isolation, and it should not destroy the sense of humor…. (1100:7) 100:6.5
…Since true religion is a matter of personal spiritual experience, it is inevitable that each individual religionist must have his own and personal interpretation of the realization of that spiritual experience. (1091:6) 99:5.7
…Religion reaches out for undiscovered ideals, unexplored realities, superhuman values, divine wisdom, and true spirit attainment. True religion does all of this; all other beliefs are not worthy of the name…. (1781.1) 160:5.5
The UB authors have much more to say about religion. A Melchizedek alone provided us with five Papers on it:
Paper 99 – The Social Problems of Religion
Paper 100 – Religion in Human Experience
Paper 101 – The Real Nature of Religion
Paper 102 – The Foundations of Religious Faith
Paper 103 – The Reality of Religious Experience***
Several times the authors declare morality is a part of religion, but not the central part:
…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…. (1126:4) 102:7.4
…Evolutionary religion may become ethical, but only revealed religion becomes truly and spiritually moral…. (40:6) 2:6.2
…The overstressed and isolated morality of modern religion, which fails to hold the devotion and loyalty of many twentieth-century men, would rehabilitate itself if, in addition to its moral mandates, it would give equal consideration to the truths of science, philosophy, and spiritual experience, and to the beauties of the physical creation, the charm of intellectual art, and the grandeur of genuine character achievement…. (43.2) 2:7.9
…a new and righteous vision of morality will attract all that is good in the mind of man and challenge that which is best in the human soul…. (43.3) 2:7.10
…The seed of theoretical truth is dead, the highest moral concepts without effect, unless and until the divine Spirit breathes upon the forms of truth and quickens the formulas of righteousness…. (380:7) 34:6.6
***
The Midwayers reach back to horse and carriage days for this in today’s reading:
…Harness your energies and bridle your passions; be calm while you await the majestic unfolding of an endless career of progressive adventure and thrilling discovery…. (2076.1)195:5.10
Ride on! :)
.
They encourage us to see the dominance of goodness:
…You do not view merely white patches of good which show up miserably against a black background of evil…. (2076.3)195:5.12
Compare this in today’s reading:
…When there is so much good truth to publish and proclaim, why should men dwell so much upon the evil in the world just because it appears to be a fact? (2076:4) 195:5.13
…with this from Jesus, in Paper 181:
“…In this world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer; I have triumphed in the world and shown you the way to eternal joy and everlasting service….” (1954:3) 181:1.6
***
And finally, compare this from the last paragraph of today’s text:
…we approach this insight of the soul through the love of the beautiful, the pursuit of truth, loyalty to duty, and the worship of divine goodness. But of all these values, love is the true guide to real insight…. (2076:5) 195:5.14
…with this in Paper 192:
“…Devote your life to proving that love is the greatest thing in the world. It is the love of God that impels men to seek salvation. Love is the ancestor of all spiritual goodness, the essence of the true and the beautiful….” (2047:5) 192:2.1
Love appears in very many of the 84 Truth, Beauty and Goodness quotes:
…The God of universal love unfailingly manifests himself to every one of his creatures up to the fullness of that creature’s capacity to spiritually grasp the qualities of divine truth, beauty, and goodness…. P.27 – §0
…Truth, beauty, and goodness are divine realities, and as man ascends the scale of spiritual living, these supreme qualities of the Eternal become increasingly co-ordinated and unified in God, who is love…. P.43 – §3
…Truth is coherent, beauty attractive, goodness stabilizing. And when these values of that which is real are co-ordinated in personality experience, the result is a high order of love conditioned by wisdom and qualified by loyalty…. P.43 – §5
…The Hebrews based their religion on goodness; the Greeks on beauty; both religions sought truth. Jesus revealed a God of love, and love is all-embracing of truth, beauty, and goodness…. P.67 – §4
…In the Trinity Teacher Sons the love, mercy, and ministry of the three Paradise Deities are co-ordinated on the highest time-space value-levels and are presented to the universes as living truth, divine goodness, and true spiritual beauty…. P.233 – §0
…Mortal man must, through the recognition of truth, the appreciation of beauty, and the worship of goodness, evolve the recognition of a God of love and then progress through ascending deity levels to the comprehension of the Supreme…. P.641 – §4
…To finite man truth, beauty, and goodness embrace the full revelation of divinity reality. As this love-comprehension of Deity finds spiritual expression in the lives of God-knowing mortals, there are yielded the fruits of divinity: intellectual peace, social progress, moral satisfaction, spiritual joy, and cosmic wisdom…. P.648 – §3
…religion is genuine and worth while if it fosters in the individual an experience in which the sovereignty of truth, beauty, and goodness prevails, for such is the true spiritual concept of supreme reality. And through love and worship this becomes meaningful as fellowship with man and sonship with God…. P.1089 – §12
…Spirituality enhances the ability to discover beauty in things, recognize truth in meanings, and discover goodness in values. Spiritual development is determined by capacity therefor and is directly proportional to the elimination of the selfish qualities of love…. P.1096 – §1
…Reason deals with factual knowledge; wisdom, with philosophy and revelation; faith, with living spiritual experience. Through truth man attains beauty and by spiritual love ascends to goodness…. P.1142 – §1
…a Father life is one predicated on truth, sensitive to beauty, and dominated by goodness. Such a God-knowing person is inwardly illuminated by worship and outwardly devoted to the wholehearted service of the universal brotherhood of all personalities, a service ministry which is filled with mercy and motivated by love…. P.1175 – §1
…The understandings of truth, beauty, and goodness, morality, ethics, duty, love, divinity, origin, existence, purpose, destiny, time, space, even Deity, are only relatively true…. P.1260 – §3
…An experience is good when it heightens the appreciation of beauty, augments the moral will, enhances the discernment of truth, enlarges the capacity to love and serve one’s fellows, exalts the spiritual ideals, and unifies the supreme human motives of time with the eternal plans of the indwelling Adjuster…. P.1458 – §2
…He revealed a goodness equal to God. He exalted love–truth, beauty, and goodness–as the divine ideal and the eternal reality…. P.1583 – §5
…God is not a hypothesis formulated to unify the human concepts of truth, beauty, and goodness; he is the personality of love from whom all of these universe manifestations are derived…. P.2095 – §8
…Love is the highest motivation which man may utilize in his universe ascent. But love, divested of truth, beauty, and goodness, is only a sentiment, a philosophic distortion, a psychic illusion, a spiritual deception…. P.2096 – §5
…This concept of love generates in the soul of man that superanimal effort to find truth, beauty, and goodness; and when he does find them, he is glorified in their embrace; he is consumed with the desire to live them…. P.2096 – §8
84 Uses of Truth, Beauty & Goodness In 16 Languages
***
In tomorrow’s reading, Section 6. Materialism, the Midwayers discourse on the relative roles of religion and science as they impinge on life as it is lived on Urantia in the wake of two defaults and an incarnation of our universe sovereign, who in his majestic life showed us the way to spiritual progress and eternal existence.
Overview of Paper 195 – After Pentecost
1. Influence of the Greeks
2. The Roman Influence
3. Under the Roman Empire
4. The European Dark Ages
5. The Modern Problem
6. Materialism
7. The Vulnerability of Materialism
8. Secular Totalitarianism
9. Christianity’s Problem
10. The FutureThis group of papers [121-196] was sponsored by a commission of twelve Urantia midwayers acting under the supervision of a Melchizedek revelatory director. The basis of this narrative was supplied by a secondary midwayer who was onetime assigned to the superhuman watchcare of the Apostle Andrew.
Listen toPaper 195: (click the speaker icon at the top of the page)
Thanks for reading. Members’ thoughts, reflections, insights, observations, comments, corrections and questions about today’s OPAD presentation are invited.
Much love, Rick/OPAD host.
Richard E Warren
What a mind expander!
So much – so fast! So glad that newer generations blessed with differential-generational bestowed personalities can progressively carry foreward. Civility is certainly important here as Jesus seemed to note great awareness of it while still being revealatory. Appears science is trending towards higher ethereal-metaphsical approaches to bring reasonableness and factuality to its discoveries; generational-genetic gene progression seems to aid and improve the quick perceptions of youth; stagnant religious dogmatism seems to be lagging in foreward moment as seen in current situations causing unending warfare. Actually retrogressive. The unification of these three arenas is needed in order for the values of love: truth, beauty and goodness – values we recognize as emdodied by that fragment of God’s nature – our Thought Adjuster – to be manifested in our life experiences. Conceptual ideals with relative meanings by successive generations to be brought to realizable factualizations while we live here. Ethics based on materialistic humanism is currently failing us – is again retrogressive in action. I believe were are inching foreward:…Spirituality enhances the ability to discover beauty in things, recognize truth in meanings, and discover goodness in values. Spiritual development is determined by capacity therefor and is directly proportional to the elimination of the selfish qualities of love…. P.1096 – §1
Walk with God. May His Peace be unto you.
What a mind expander!
So much – so fast! So glad that newer generations blessed with differential-generational bestowed personalities can progressively carry foreward. Civility is certainly important here as Jesus seemed to note great awareness of it while still being revealatory. Appears science is trending towards higher ethereal-metaphsical approaches to bring reasonableness and factuality to its discoveries; generational-genetic gene progression seems to aid and improve the quick perceptions of youth; stagnant religious dogmatism seems to be lagging in foreward moment as seen in current situations causing unending warfare. Actually retrogressive. The unification of these three arenas is needed in order for the values of love: truth, beauty and goodness – values we recognize as emdodied by that fragment of God’s nature – our Thought Adjuster – to be manifested in our life experiences. Conceptual ideals with relative meanings by successive generations to be brought to realizable factualizations while we live here. Ethics based on materialistic humanism is currently failing us – is again retrogressive in action.I believe were are inching foreward:
…Spirituality enhances the ability to discover beauty in things, recognize truth in meanings, and discover goodness in values. Spiritual development is determined by capacity therefor and is directly proportional to the elimination of the selfish qualities of love…. P.1096 – §1
Fascinating isn’t it! One inch forward and 63/64ths backward. Metric version: 1 meter forward, 999 millimeters back.
That’s the definition of overall progress on Urantia, with frequent dips into retrogression.
Richard E Warren
Welcome to The OPAD Online Study Session
Today’s Presentation
Paper 195 – AFTER PENTECOST
6. Materialism
Scientists have unintentionally precipitated mankind into a materialistic panic; they have started an unthinking run on the moral bank of the ages, but this bank of human experience has vast spiritual resources; it can stand the demands being made upon it. Only unthinking men become panicky about the spiritual assets of the human race. When the materialistic-secular panic is over, the religion of Jesus will not be found bankrupt. The spiritual bank of the kingdom of heaven will be paying out faith, hope, and moral security to all who draw upon it “in His name.”
(2076.7)195:6.2 No matter what the apparent conflict between materialism and the teachings of Jesus may be, you can rest assured that, in the ages to come, the teachings of the Master will fully triumph. In reality, true religion cannot become involved in any controversy with science; it is in no way concerned with material things. Religion is simply indifferent to, but sympathetic with, science, while it supremely concerns itself with the scientist.
(2076.8)195:6.3 The pursuit of mere knowledge, without the attendant interpretation of wisdom and the spiritual insight of religious experience, eventually leads to pessimism and human despair. A little knowledge is truly disconcerting.
(2076.9)195:6.4 At the time of this writing the worst of the materialistic age is over; the day of a better understanding is already beginning to dawn. The higher minds of the scientific world are no longer wholly materialistic in their philosophy, but the rank and file of the people still lean in that direction as a result of former teachings. But this age of physical realism is only a passing episode in man’s life on earth. Modern science has left true religion — the teachings of Jesus as translated in the lives of his believers — untouched. All science has done is to destroy the childlike illusions of the misinterpretations of life.
(2077.1)195:6.5 Science is a quantitative experience, religion a qualitative experience, as regards man’s life on earth. Science deals with phenomena; religion, with origins, values, and goals. To assign causes as an explanation of physical phenomena is to confess ignorance of ultimates and in the end only leads the scientist straight back to the first great cause — the Universal Father of Paradise.
(2077.2)195:6.6 The violent swing from an age of miracles to an age of machines has proved altogether upsetting to man. The cleverness and dexterity of the false philosophies of mechanism belie their very mechanistic contentions. The fatalistic agility of the mind of a materialist forever disproves his assertions that the universe is a blind and purposeless energy phenomenon.
(2077.3)195:6.7 The mechanistic naturalism of some supposedly educated men and the thoughtless secularism of the man in the street are both exclusively concerned with things; they are barren of all real values, sanctions, and satisfactions of a spiritual nature, as well as being devoid of faith, hope, and eternal assurances. One of the great troubles with modern life is that man thinks he is too busy to find time for spiritual meditation and religious devotion.
(2077.4)195:6.8 Materialism reduces man to a soulless automaton and constitutes him merely an arithmetical symbol finding a helpless place in the mathematical formula of an unromantic and mechanistic universe. But whence comes all this vast universe of mathematics without a Master Mathematician? Science may expatiate on the conservation of matter, but religion validates the conservation of men’s souls — it concerns their experience with spiritual realities and eternal values.
(2077.5)195:6.9 The materialistic sociologist of today surveys a community, makes a report thereon, and leaves the people as he found them. Nineteen hundred years ago, unlearned Galileans surveyed Jesus giving his life as a spiritual contribution to man’s inner experience and then went out and turned the whole Roman Empire upside down.
(2077.6)195:6.10 But religious leaders are making a great mistake when they try to call modern man to spiritual battle with the trumpet blasts of the Middle Ages. Religion must provide itself with new and up-to-date slogans. Neither democracy nor any other political panacea will take the place of spiritual progress. False religions may represent an evasion of reality, but Jesus in his gospel introduced mortal man to the very entrance upon an eternal reality of spiritual progression.
(2077.7)195:6.11 To say that mind “emerged” from matter explains nothing. If the universe were merely a mechanism and mind were unapart from matter, we would never have two differing interpretations of any observed phenomenon. The concepts of truth, beauty, and goodness are not inherent in either physics or chemistry. A machine cannot know, much less know truth, hunger for righteousness, and cherish goodness.
(2077.8)195:6.12 Science may be physical, but the mind of the truth-discerning scientist is at once supermaterial. Matter knows not truth, neither can it love mercy nor delight in spiritual realities. Moral convictions based on spiritual enlightenment and rooted in human experience are just as real and certain as mathematical deductions based on physical observations, but on another and higher level.
(2077.9)195:6.13 If men were only machines, they would react more or less uniformly to a material universe. Individuality, much less personality, would be nonexistent.
(2077.10)195:6.14 The fact of the absolute mechanism of Paradise at the center of the universe of universes, in the presence of the unqualified volition of the Second Source and Center, makes forever certain that determiners are not the exclusive law of the cosmos. Materialism is there, but it is not exclusive; mechanism is there, but it is not unqualified; determinism is there, but it is not alone.
(2078.1)195:6.15 The finite universe of matter would eventually become uniform and deterministic but for the combined presence of mind and spirit. The influence of the cosmic mind constantly injects spontaneity into even the material worlds.
(2078.2)195:6.16 Freedom or initiative in any realm of existence is directly proportional to the degree of spiritual influence and cosmic-mind control; that is, in human experience, the degree of the actuality of doing “the Father’s will.” And so, when you once start out to find God, that is the conclusive proof that God has already found you.
(2078.3)195:6.17 The sincere pursuit of goodness, beauty, and truth leads to God. And every scientific discovery demonstrates the existence of both freedom and uniformity in the universe. The discoverer was free to make the discovery. The thing discovered is real and apparently uniform, or else it could not have become known as a thing.
***
[Each OPAD presentation is copied from The Urantia Book published by Urantia Foundation. Questions and comments related to the Paper under discussion are welcome and encouraged. In-depth questions and related topics may be studied in branch threads in the OPAD, or other subforums, as you require. Thank you for studying with us.]
Richard E Warren
.
Greetings rgardini, nelsong, Bonita, Brad, Rick B, Keyrn, Alina, Carolyn, Carola, Fellow Students, Forum Friends, Members and Visitors,
Can we blame science for setting off the “materialistic panic”? Science simply did its job and released us from the shackles of superstition, the fear of ghosts, and the shaman’s magic. From today’s text:
…All science has done is to destroy the childlike illusions of the misinterpretations of life….(2076.9)195:6.4
This revelation was being written during “the great depression”, a time when banks failed in unprecedented numbers, when bankruptcy was the bane of the day. Good to know the bank of Nebadon can handle any and all runs on it. From today’s reading:
…The spiritual bank of the kingdom of heaven will be paying out faith, hope, and moral security to all who draw upon it “in His name….” (2076.6)195:6.1
This is a beautiful statement, ending with emphasis on, and concern for, the one attempting to discover truth:
…Religion is simply indifferent to, but sympathetic with, science, while it supremely concerns itself with the scientist…. (2076.7)195:6.2
***
This in today’s reading:
…A little knowledge is truly disconcerting…. (2076.8)195:6.3
…is reflected in Paper 131, a discourse on Taoism:
“…The wise man universalizes his heart. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing….”(1452.2)131:8.4
***
About this statement in today’s reading:
…At the time of this writing the worst of the materialistic age is over; the day of a better understanding is already beginning to dawn…. (2076.9)195:6.4
The Midwayers wrote that about 80 years ago. Readers still debate it. Are we truly on the downhill side of the peak of materialism? In my experience, people today, in general, do seem to understand the more important things of life are not tangible. They want a good family, love and God. Even unbelievers strive for happiness, knowledge, and the moral high ground rather than for wealth and possessions.
…Science deals with phenomena; religion, with origins, values, and goals…. (2077.1)195:6.5
And the good and true scientist does eventually find God, or at least the First Cause. From today’s reading:
…in the end only leads the scientist straight back to the first great cause — the Universal Father of Paradise….(2077.1)195:6.5
We can easily be fooled, but a close and honest inspection reveals that mind itself if a reflection of a goal oriented universe, not a universe that somehow fell together with no one creating or directing it. The Midwayers affirm this in today’s reading:
…The fatalistic agility of the mind of a materialist forever disproves his assertions that the universe is a blind and purposeless energy phenomenon…. (2077.2)195:6.6This statement is still true:
…One of the great troubles with modern life is that man thinks he is too busy to find time for spiritual meditation and religious devotion…. (2077.3)195:6.7
…perhaps even more so with the proliferation of material distractions that recently became available to nearly everyone on the planet.
***
Science may be a powerful influence, but spirit is more powerful–IF it is tapped. Even if it is tapped and spread by scientifically ignorant and unlettered humans. From today’s reading:
…Nineteen hundred years ago, unlearned Galileans surveyed Jesus giving his life as a spiritual contribution to man’s inner experience and then went out and turned the whole Roman Empire upside down…. (2077.5)195:6.9
***The Midwayers say we of this new age must find “new slogans”. What should they be? Simply ‘the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of humanity’? What else? Maybe this one from Paper 102:
…the real is the good and the good is the real…. (1122.11)102:3.15
***
Compare this in today’s reading:
…A machine cannot know, much less know truth, hunger for righteousness, and cherish goodness…. (2077:7) 195:6.11
…with this in tomorrow’s:
…Machines do not think, create, dream, aspire, idealize, hunger for truth, or thirst for righteousness…. (2079:9) 195:7.13
***
The Midwayers declare this in today’s OPAD:
…Science may be physical, but the mind of the truth-discerning scientist is at once supermaterial. Matter knows not truth, neither can it love mercy nor delight in spiritual realities…. (2077:8) 195:6.12
In Paper 90, the Melchizedek author says this:
…Only facts and truth court the full light of comprehension and rejoice in the illumination and enlightenment of scientific research…. (992:1) 90:4.9
***
Paradise and the Second Source and Center (the Eternal Son) cited in today’s reading were revealed in Part 1 of the UB.
Paper 11:The Eternal Isle of Paradise
The “cosmic mind”, mentioned in today’s text:
…The influence of the cosmic mind constantly injects spontaneity into even the material worlds…. (2078.1)195:6.15
…is revealed elsewhere. In fact it is the title of Paper 16:6 It begins:
…The Master Spirits are the sevenfold source of the cosmic mind, the intellectual potential of the grand universe. This cosmic mind is a subabsolute manifestation of the mind of the Third Source and Center…. (191.4)16:6.1***
That God has found the ones who seek God, expressed in today’s reading:
…when you once start out to find God, that is the conclusive proof that God has already found you…. (2078.2)195:6.16
…also appears in Paper 130, Jesus speaking:
“…If you truly want to find God, that desire is in itself evidence that you have already found him. Your trouble is not that you cannot find God, for the Father has already found you; your trouble is simply that you do not know God….” (1440.2)130:8.2***
Twice in today’s reading the truth, beauty and goodness trio appear:
…The concepts of truth, beauty, and goodness are not inherent in either physics or chemistry….(2077.7)195:6.11
…The sincere pursuit of goodness, beauty, and truth leads to God…. (2078.3)195:6.17
As mentioned in yesterday’s OPAD, many are the references to truth, beauty and goodness:
84 Uses of Truth, Beauty & Goodness In 16 Languages***
The Midwayers end this Section with an italicized word, and a sage philosophical axiom for scientists:
…The thing discovered is real and apparently uniform, or else it could not have become known as a thing…. (2078.3)195:6.17
***
In tomorrow’s reading, part 1 of Section 7. The Vulnerability of Materialism, the Midwayers write about the reality and pursuit of spiritual values, as opposed to amassing wealth, perfecting skills, and seeking pleasure–mechanistic, mental/emotional, and physical pursuits.
Overview of Paper 195 – After Pentecost
1. Influence of the Greeks
2. The Roman Influence
3. Under the Roman Empire
4. The European Dark Ages
5. The Modern Problem
6. Materialism
7. The Vulnerability of Materialism
8. Secular Totalitarianism
9. Christianity’s Problem
10. The FutureThis group of papers [121-196] was sponsored by a commission of twelve Urantia midwayers acting under the supervision of a Melchizedek revelatory director. The basis of this narrative was supplied by a secondary midwayer who was onetime assigned to the superhuman watchcare of the Apostle Andrew.
Listen toPaper 195: (click the speaker icon at the top of the page)
Thanks for reading. Members’ thoughts, reflections, insights, observations, comments, corrections and questions about today’s OPAD presentation are invited.
Much love, Rick/OPAD host.
Richard E Warren
Great follow up Rick! The following quote struck a cord:
“…If you truly want to find God, that desire is in itself evidence that you have already found him. Your trouble is not that you cannot find God, for the Father has already found you; your trouble is simply that you do not know God….” (1440.2)130:8.2
Despite this accepted knowledge. Those that ‘know’ God find it difficult to break the pattern of addiction to material gain as is practiced by our capitalistic system today. Our current socio-economic system seems to be dominatedby our POP CULTURE. Eighty years for breaking this habituation is no where near a ‘blink of an eye’. Today’s standards may be just in the beginning stage or becoming stage – especially when college graduates today can’t buy houses or cars and must live with their parents – let alone the cost of bearing and raising children. Include a world market economy – standards of living are going down. Perhaps the economic boom we experienced is over. From proverty to excessive riches is great but can it be repeated? Room here to commence and sustain spiritual growth. Values reprioritized – no?
Walk with God. May His Peace be unto you.
Great follow up Rick! The following quote struck a cord: “…If you truly want to find God, that desire is in itself evidence that you have already found him. Your trouble is not that you cannot find God, for the Father has already found you; your trouble is simply that you do not know God….” (1440.2)130:8.2 Despite this accepted knowledge. Those that ‘know’ God find it difficult to break the pattern of addiction to material gain as is practiced by our capitalistic system today. Our current socio-economic system seems to be dominatedby our POP CULTURE. Eightyyears for breaking this habituation is no where near a ‘blink of an eye’. Today’s standards may be just in the beginning stage or becoming stage – especially when college graduates today can’t buy houses or cars and must live with their parents – let alone the cost of bearing and raising children. Include a world market economy – standards of living are going down. Perhaps the economic boom we experienced is over. From proverty to excessive riches is great but can it be repeated? Room here to commence and sustain spiritual growth. Values reprioritized – no?
Thanks Ray!! The world economy seems to gradually be softening the boom and bust cycles, but certainly not totally, eh? Hard to predict how this century will do, with the population topping out at close to 10 billion in just 35 years. Economic sustainability would be a grand achievement, but we know it won’t come until those values are prioritized upward, that the only things of real value are values…We’ll see, or rather, our grandchildren will.
Richard E Warren
But there are physicists on Uversa!
Hmm…must have missed that, nelsong. Where?
Richard E Warren
PS. Two (somewhat) parallel quotes from the New Testament that appeared in today’s OPAD:
…Nineteen hundred years ago, unlearned Galileans surveyed Jesus giving his life as a spiritual contribution to man’s inner experience and then went out and turned the whole Roman Empire upside down…. (2077.5)195:6.9
From Acts 4:
13 Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marvelled; and they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus.
From Acts 17:
6 And when they found them not, they drew Jason and certain brethren unto the rulers of the city, crying, These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also;
Richard E Warren
Welcome to The OPAD Online Study Session
Today’s Presentation
Paper 195 – AFTER PENTECOST
7. The Vulnerability of Materialism
[Part 1 of 2]
How foolish it is for material-minded man to allow such vulnerable theories as those of a mechanistic universe to deprive him of the vast spiritual resources of the personal experience of true religion. Facts never quarrel with real spiritual faith; theories may. Better that science should be devoted to the destruction of superstition rather than attempting the overthrow of religious faith — human belief in spiritual realities and divine values.
(2078.5)195:7.2 Science should do for man materially what religion does for him spiritually: extend the horizon of life and enlarge his personality. True science can have no lasting quarrel with true religion. The “scientific method” is merely an intellectual yardstick wherewith to measure material adventures and physical achievements. But being material and wholly intellectual, it is utterly useless in the evaluation of spiritual realities and religious experiences.
(2078.6)195:7.3 The inconsistency of the modern mechanist is: If this were merely a material universe and man only a machine, such a man would be wholly unable to recognize himself as such a machine, and likewise would such a machine-man be wholly unconscious of the fact of the existence of such a material universe. The materialistic dismay and despair of a mechanistic science has failed to recognize the fact of the spirit-indwelt mind of the scientist whose very supermaterial insight formulates these mistaken and self-contradictory concepts of a materialistic universe.
(2078.7)195:7.4 Paradise values of eternity and infinity, of truth, beauty, and goodness, are concealed within the facts of the phenomena of the universes of time and space. But it requires the eye of faith in a spirit-born mortal to detect and discern these spiritual values.
(2078.8)195:7.5 The realities and values of spiritual progress are not a “psychologic projection” — a mere glorified daydream of the material mind. Such things are the spiritual forecasts of the indwelling Adjuster, the spirit of God living in the mind of man. And let not your dabblings with the faintly glimpsed findings of “relativity” disturb your concepts of the eternity and infinity of God. And in all your solicitation concerning the necessity for self-expression do not make the mistake of failing to provide for Adjuster-expression, the manifestation of your real and better self.
(2079.1)195:7.6 If this were only a material universe, material man would never be able to arrive at the concept of the mechanistic character of such an exclusively material existence. This very mechanistic concept of the universe is in itself a nonmaterial phenomenon of mind, and all mind is of nonmaterial origin, no matter how thoroughly it may appear to be materially conditioned and mechanistically controlled.
(2079.2)195:7.7 The partially evolved mental mechanism of mortal man is not overendowed with consistency and wisdom. Man’s conceit often outruns his reason and eludes his logic.
(2079.3)195:7.8 The very pessimism of the most pessimistic materialist is, in and of itself, sufficient proof that the universe of the pessimist is not wholly material. Both optimism and pessimism are concept reactions in a mind conscious of values as well as of facts. If the universe were truly what the materialist regards it to be, man as a human machine would then be devoid of all conscious recognition of that very fact. Without the consciousness of the concept of values within the spirit-born mind, the fact of universe materialism and the mechanistic phenomena of universe operation would be wholly unrecognized by man. One machine cannot be conscious of the nature or value of another machine.
(2079.4)195:7.9 A mechanistic philosophy of life and the universe cannot be scientific because science recognizes and deals only with materials and facts. Philosophy is inevitably superscientific. Man is a material fact of nature, but his life is a phenomenon which transcends the material levels of nature in that it exhibits the control attributes of mind and the creative qualities of spirit.
(2079.5)195:7.10 The sincere effort of man to become a mechanist represents the tragic phenomenon of that man’s futile effort to commit intellectual and moral suicide. But he cannot do it.
(2079.6)195:7.11 If the universe were only material and man only a machine, there would be no science to embolden the scientist to postulate this mechanization of the universe. Machines cannot measure, classify, nor evaluate themselves. Such a scientific piece of work could be executed only by some entity of supermachine status.
(2079.7)195:7.12 If universe reality is only one vast machine, then man must be outside of the universe and apart from it in order to recognize such a fact and become conscious of the insight of such an evaluation.
(2079.8)195:7.13 If man is only a machine, by what technique does this man come to believe or claim to know that he is only a machine? The experience of self-conscious evaluation of one’s self is never an attribute of a mere machine. A self-conscious and avowed mechanist is the best possible answer to mechanism. If materialism were a fact, there could be no self-conscious mechanist. It is also true that one must first be a moral person before one can perform immoral acts.
***
[Each OPAD presentation is copied from The Urantia Book published by Urantia Foundation. Questions and comments related to the Paper under discussion are welcome and encouraged. In-depth questions and related topics may be studied in branch threads in the OPAD, or other subforums, as you require. Thank you for studying with us.]
Richard E Warren
What a beautiful contrast to the attributes of personality as it functions with the mortal nature of man!!
(2079.8)195:7.13 If man is only a machine, by what technique does this man come to believe or claim to know that he is only a machine? The experience of self-conscious evaluation of one’s self is never an attribute of a mere machine. A self-conscious and avowed mechanist is the best possible answer to mechanism. If materialism were a fact, there could be no self-conscious mechanist. It is also true that one must first be a moral person before one can perform immoral acts.
The unification of the constituent parts of one’s nature, the self -consciousness awareness with the ability to recognize others and be known by others and the capacity to make moral choices are attributes of a bestowed personality. Pre-requisites for the adjutant mind spirits, the Thought Adjusters and the Spirit of Truth. Our 1st moral self-choice decision is in contradistinction to the secular humanitarian materialistic ethics. Even our ability to discerment to recall the past and project into the future in the present now is remarkable. The enlargement of personality’s functional attributes on this supreme level is purely an individualistic choice. A faith-motivated choice based on reasonableness and influenced by spiritual influences not robotic/mechanistic process. Such a great reading!
Walk with God. May His Peace be unto you.
Login to reply to this topic.
Not registered? Sign up here.