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Greetings and Welcome to all who might attend this study of the one and only ‘true religion’ as taught by the Urantia Papers!
– and that is the religion that is personally experienced and expressed by each person in their/our own individual and unique way.
Religion is often considered institutional or group in function and this is indeed one such form. The UB calls this evolutionary religion as opposed to personal religion or one’s religious experience. These papers we study here (100-112) are about that personal religious awakening, spiritual nature, and transformational experience that each person – religionist – has in common with all others who also respond to the Spirit within and choose to identify personally with our Spirit Nature. Spiritualization is a progressive and transformative experience that has much in common one religionist and believer to another…but is always and must always be a very personal and unique experience which cannot be given to or taken from or loaned or borrowed from one to another and will never be uniform in its experience but will always be profoundly personal and unique to each of us who are so transformed.
Personal religion is a combination of our embrace and/or rejection of evolutionary religion; combined with something called personal revelation by the Spirit ministry in mind; and our ability and willingness to hear and respond to that ministry; and our growing experiential maturity and wisdom in the hearing and response to that ministry; and the personal relationship between our mind and the Spirit within; and our ability to discover meanings and values in circumstances, situations, and relationships; and the making of decisions based on our growing spiritualized nature and volitional desire to express our highest ideals and motives in our every day life; and the expressions of and by our growing love for others and growing desire to serve others, both the each and the all; and as we thusly grow, to experience and express those Divine Fruits of the Spirit which naturally arrive as we attach our own, individual, and personal branch to the Living Vine of the Creators and Loving Rulers of this universe and world and life and our being….or, in other words, as we recognize, respond to, realize, actualize, and become one with Universe Reality. Religion In Human Experience and The Real Nature of Religion are about BECOMING more and more REAL over time so that we might ATTAIN our potential DESTINY of eternal life.
The experience and the expression of True Religion in each life is a wonderful eternal record and treasure of the Creators and all other beings in Creation…it is our gift to all others. The real nature of religion is progressively transformative and a transcendent experience that will take the lowliest of material born creatures into eternal adventure and partnership with God in an ever perfecting relationship that will reflect the will and the way, the purpose, power, and plan of God. Yes, we are so blessed!!
While each form of evolutionary religion tends toward uniformity and conformity in the group and their shared beliefs, creeds, doctrines, ceremonies, and other behaviors of their flocks….no two individuals ever actually have the same religious experience or perspective – and cannot – even those in the same group religion who do also share such beliefs and practices. We are each too unique and personal and individual in our life experience, perspective, and response to the Spirit within us for any great uniformity of religious experience and personal progress in spiritualization. The UB teaches that this is the norm and a blessing and something to embrace and celebrate and serves the greater good for the all….even Deity and the Creators benefit and rejoice by this individualization of both our religious experience and our expression of that experience!!
I was profoundly impressed by this truth about religion when I first read these Papers about ….The Real Nature Of Religion!!
Please feel free to comment, share, ask, and post any related text to this topic and to cast forward or back in the Papers to consider and reflect upon this subject as we study here together. Welcome.
Paper 101
The Real Nature of Religion101:0.1 (1104.1) RELIGION, as a human experience, ranges from the primitive fear slavery of the evolving savage up to the sublime and magnificent faith liberty of those civilized mortals who are superbly conscious of sonship with the eternal God.
101:0.2 (1104.2) Religion is the ancestor of the advanced ethics and morals of progressive social evolution. But religion, as such, is not merely a moral movement, albeit the outward and social manifestations of religion are mightily influenced by the ethical and moral momentum of human society. Always is religion the inspiration of man’s evolving nature, but it is not the secret of that evolution.
101:0.3 (1104.3) Religion, the conviction-faith of the personality, can always triumph over the superficially contradictory logic of despair born in the unbelieving material mind. There really is a true and genuine inner voice, that “true light which lights every man who comes into the world.” And this spirit leading is distinct from the ethical prompting of human conscience. The feeling of religious assurance is more than an emotional feeling. The assurance of religion transcends the reason of the mind, even the logic of philosophy. Religion is faith, trust, and assurance.
1. True Religion
101:1.1 (1104.4) True religion is not a system of philosophic belief which can be reasoned out and substantiated by natural proofs, neither is it a fantastic and mystic experience of indescribable feelings of ecstasy which can be enjoyed only by the romantic devotees of mysticism. Religion is not the product of reason, but viewed from within, it is altogether reasonable. Religion is not derived from the logic of human philosophy, but as a mortal experience it is altogether logical. Religion is the experiencing of divinity in the consciousness of a moral being of evolutionary origin; it represents true experience with eternal realities in time, the realization of spiritual satisfactions while yet in the flesh.
Jesus taught about the one true religion….the new religion…the religion of the Good News he proclaimed…The Religion of the Spirit!!
155:5.5 [Part IV]
3. 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.
Powerful stuff Bradly! Thanks for reminding us of these great truths about True Religion and that it is the center stone of the teachings of the UB. What a transformed world we would have if this message could become more pronounced in the world.
It seems to me that so many are stuck in the idea that religion can only be experienced by how someone else has defined it, which is a great roadblock to happiness.
This message of love will eventually succeed and I am very excited about it.
Thank you Bradly.
Religion In Human Experience and The Real Nature of Religion are about BECOMING more and more REAL over time so that we might ATTAIN our potential DESTINY of eternal life.
And likewise, the seven psychic circles are also about becoming more real over time.
10:6.10 3. Personality reality. The degree of selfhood reality is directly determined by circle conquest. Persons become more real as they ascend from the seventh to the first level of mortal existence.
But attaining eternal life should be taken for granted, so I would rather say that our destiny is DIVINITY ATTAINMENT. The psychic circles, and likewise the real nature of religion, are really about divinity attainment. Here are a ton of quotes ’cause I know yah love ’em:
(365.4) 32:5.8 The goal of eternity is ahead! The adventure of divinity attainment lies before you! The race for perfection is on! whosoever will may enter, and certain victory will crown the efforts of every human being who will run the race of faith and trust, depending every step of the way on the leading of the indwelling Adjuster and on the guidance of that good spirit of the Universe Son, which so freely has been poured out upon all flesh.
(66.5) 5:4.1 The morality of the religions of evolution drives men forward in the God quest by the motive power of fear. The religions of revelation allure men to seek for a God of love because they crave to become like him. But religion is not merely a passive feeling of “absolute dependence” and “surety of survival”; it is a living and dynamic experience of divinity attainment predicated on humanity service.
(1107:4) 101:2.12 Your deepest nature—the divine Adjuster—creates within you a hunger and thirst for righteousness, a certain craving for divine perfection. Religion is the faith act of the recognition of this inner urge to divine attainment; and thus is brought about that soul trust and assurance of which you become conscious as the way of salvation, the technique of the survival of personality and all those values which you have come to look upon as being true and good.
(631.3) 55:6.7 This is the story of the magnificent goal of mortal striving on the evolutionary worlds; and it all takes place even before human beings enter upon their morontia careers; all of this splendid development is attainable by material mortals on the inhabited worlds, the very first stage of that endless and incomprehensible career of Paradise ascension and divinity attainment.
(647.3) 56:10.12 Goodness is the mental recognition of the relative values of the diverse levels of divine perfection. The recognition of goodness implies a mind of moral status, a personal mind with ability to discriminate between good and evil. But the possession of goodness, greatness, is the measure of real divinity attainment.
(1200.5) 109:6.5 This Adjuster did indeed triumph in Jesus’ human mind — that mind which in each of life’s recurring situations maintained a consecrated dedication to the Father’s will, saying, “Not my will, but yours, be done.” Such decisive consecration constitutes the true passport from the limitations of human nature to the finality of divine attainment.
(1271.3) 116:3.5 The creature bestowals of the Paradise orders of sonship enable these divine Sons to enrich their personalities by the acquisition of the actual nature of universe creatures, while such bestowals unfailingly reveal to the creatures themselves the Paradise path of divinity attainment.
(1273.2) 116:4.10 When the bestowal Sons reveal new ways for man to find God, they are not creating these paths of divinity attainment; rather are they illuminating the everlasting highways of progression which lead through the presence of the Supreme to the person of the Paradise Father.
(1574.8) 140:5.15 And then Jesus went on to instruct his followers in the realization of the chief purpose of all human struggling — perfection — even divine attainment. Always he admonished them: “Be you perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.”
101:0.2 (1104.2) Religion is the ancestor of the advanced ethics and morals of progressive social evolution. But religion, as such, is not merely a moral movement, albeit the outward and social manifestations of religion are mightily influenced by the ethical and moral momentum of human society. Always is religion the inspiration of man’s evolving nature, but it is not the secret of that evolution.
I’d like to unpack the last sentence of this quote. Religion inspires man’s evolving nature but it is not the secret of that evolution. What is the secret of the evolution of man’s nature?
I think the answer to that or part of the answer anyway is….conflict resolution! In doing research on another issue I did a keyword search for “conflict” and so many quotes appeared which relate to your question Bonita….especially in Paper 103! First the link:
To the mortal mind, life appears to present us many conflicts for resolution and only by such resolution activity does experiential wisdom appear and that primarily by our frustrations, consternations, confusions, disappointments, failures, and determination to better understand and better respond to situations, circumstances, and relationships….and do so in ways in accordance with our growing awareness of reality and a maturing philosophy of living within that reality.
Isn’t growth the result of learning about and adaptation to reality? And doesn’t this include the material reality and the scientific or factual and knowledge based responses to material reality as well as spiritual realities? And isn’t philosophy that unifying, integrating, and functionalizing agency/factor which is “…the secret of the evolution of man’s nature?” And not only his nature but also his world and the coordination and integration of the spirit and material life’s we must live and balance and harmonize? Maybe so….?
There are many related quotes in the link above from Paper 103 to consider; but I found this one about Jesus as a youth which may illustrate this natural tension of conflict requiring resolution:
124:4.9 [Part IV]
Throughout this and the two following years Jesus suffered great mental distress as the result of his constant effort to adjust his personal views of religious practices and social amenities to the established beliefs of his parents. He was distraught by the conflict between the urge to be loyal to his own convictions and the conscientious admonition of dutiful submission to his parents; his supreme conflict was between two great commands which were uppermost in his youthful mind. The one was: “Be loyal to the dictates of your highest convictions of truth and righteousness.” The other was: “Honor your father and mother, for they have given you life and the nurture thereof.” However, he never shirked the responsibility of making the necessary daily adjustments between these realms of loyalty to one’s personal convictions and duty toward one’s family, and he achieved the satisfaction of effecting an increasingly harmonious blending of personal convictions and family obligations into a masterful concept of group solidarity based upon loyalty, fairness, tolerance, and love.This concept is also presented in Paper 100:
100:4.1 [Part III] Religious living is devoted living, and devoted living is creative living, original and spontaneous. New religious insights arise out of conflicts which initiate the choosing of new and better reaction habits in the place of older and inferior reaction patterns. New meanings only emerge amid conflict; and conflict persists only in the face of refusal to espouse the higher values connoted in superior meanings.
100:4.2 [Part III] Religious perplexities are inevitable; there can be no growth without psychic conflict and spiritual agitation. The organization of a philosophic standard of living entails considerable commotion in the philosophic realms of the mind. Loyalties are not exercised in behalf of the great, the good, the true, and the noble without a struggle. Effort is attendant upon clarification of spiritual vision and enhancement of cosmic insight. And the human intellect protests against being weaned from subsisting upon the nonspiritual energies of temporal existence. The slothful animal mind rebels at the effort required to wrestle with cosmic problem solving.
So you’re saying that the secret to the evolution of one’s nature, or character, involves decision making?
I’ll give it a shot:
Doesn’t the first paragraph say much about this?
“RELIGION, as a human experience, ranges from the primitive fear slavery of the evolving savage up to the sublime and magnificent faith liberty of those civilized mortals who are superbly conscious of sonship with the eternal God”
Don’t the authors try to point out our evolving nature as a result of true religious experience? That moral social and economic development evolves along with this religious experience?
So one must conclude that moral, social, economic and true religious experiences all happen in the mind? And the social developments are tied to, or an outgrowth of the experience?
But the secret (I think the authors use of this word is more like the underlying truth about how this happens, not really a secret because they are revealing it to us) must be something that develops from the fruit we bare as result of this true religious experience-in otherwords we first recognize the indwelling spirit and connect with it by doing Gods will or pledging to do his will (isnt this the nature of faith) but this does not necessarily mean we grow. We must provide favorable conditions to be grown. What are favorable conditions? (Isn’t this the nature of trust)? Then we do something as we grow, we don’t just keep it in our heads. Growth results in progress if the process works out ok.
Not going off the deep end and becoming fanatical is part of keeping our social and economic progress in line with our religious growth.
Ask yourself why religion and social conditions are different now as opposed to primitives worshiping fire? We have adjusters, the spirit of truth.
is it a coincidence that living in stone or mud huts tended to end after Jesus left our planet?
Don’t the authors try to point out our evolving nature as a result of true religious experience? That moral social and economic development evolves along with this religious experience?
I think evolution of our character does involve religious experience, but isn’t that just the inspiration part of the process? The quote says that inspiration is not the secret to our evolution of character. So, there’s another step to the process. I think that step has to do with making the decision to follow and choose the inspiring experience, then bringing it to fruition. Bradly sees it as conflict resolution, which is another way to say a resolution to the conflict between our dual natures. And, isn’t it that which changes character, and then goes on to eventually change the social and economic climate in its wake?
We’re told that the angels are the teachers of our evolving nature and the Adjuster is the essence of it.
(1245.2) 113:4.2 Mortal man, subject to Adjuster leading, is also amenable to seraphic guidance. The Adjuster is the essence of man’s eternal nature; the seraphim is the teacher of man’s evolving nature — in this life the mortal mind, in the next the morontia soul. On the mansion worlds you will be conscious and aware of seraphic instructors, but in the first life men are usually unaware of them.
So which one provides the secret to our evolving nature? The seraphim or the Adjuster? One is inspiring us from the inside, the other is teaching us from the outside.
Maybe this secret can be better understood by the nature of the three cosmic intuitions? “ material acumen, moral discrimination and spiritual insight”?
this all happens in the mind and involves our adjuster and how we express the experiences or translate that adjuster contact that happens in our highest spiritized mind into our mortal experience – things like conscience or morals.
Maybe this secret can be better understood by the nature of the three cosmic intuitions? “ material acumen, moral discrimination and spiritual insight”?
Yeah. I think that’s what Bradly is referring to when he mentions experiential wisdom which comes from adapting to reality. But I don’t think philosophy itself is the secret. Philosophy is that middle ground of mind which struggles to coordinate material thought with spiritized thought and turn it into something meaningful. It’s the method by which values transform meanings which are then made practical and actionable. The three cosmic reality responses are also referred to as thing, meaning and value.
They tell us that the Spirit of Truth provides philosophy for the soul. They also tell us moral discrimination, the second cosmic reality response, provides philosophy for the material mind. I think the goal in life is to allow spiritual insight to discover and recognize the Spirit of Truth’s philosophical meanings as the source of inspiration for the material mind to work with. But are either sources of meaning/philosophy “the secret” to evolution of character?
I’m inclined to think it’s the personality which holds the secret, the personality with it’s precious free will. Our natures evolve in the spheres of action. Growth is the association of actuals and potentials. I think we’re inspired by the potentials and evolve by the actuals. I think that’s why they say the keys are sincerity and decisions (39:4.14). Sincerity opens the mind to potentials and decisions provide the actuals.
So you’re saying that the secret to the evolution of one’s nature, or character, involves decision making?
Yes…I like that…but I wonder if it doesn’t also include and require thinking…creative thinking, problem solving thinking, the thinking which results in integration and harmonization – critical thinking. Nothing much evolves, including one’s nature or character or one’s habits of response and reflex in life’s choices without thought and purpose. We are taught religious experience requires a response in motive, intent, priority….and by that and from those our choices are differentiated now from the past and in the future from now.
“Evolution” connotes progress. The real nature of religion is progressive….the real nature of truth is progressive….the real nature of growth is progress….evolution = progress. Wisdom and mature are two of its results….although neither is a static or fixed measure but both are, like perfecting, a never ending process. It is a process more than a product and it is a process that is only truly working when growth and the fruits are realized and actualized in the being living this process of reality recognition and response.
The ministering Spirits within and the angels bring certain and specific causes for predictable effects by and within this process…according to our will, wit, wisdom, maturity, prior growth, and the fruits currently on the branch as attached to the vine….and all of that grows over time in both quantity and quality once we add volition and thoughtfulness with increasing attention, effort, and experiential skill (wisdom and maturity).
Really like this:
Bonita says above: “I’m inclined to think it’s the personality which holds the secret, the personality with it’s precious free will. Our natures evolve in the spheres of action. Growth is the association of actuals and potentials. I think we’re inspired by the potentials and evolve by the actuals. I think that’s why they say the keys are sincerity and decisions (39:4.14). Sincerity opens the mind to potentials and decisions provide the actuals.”
Yes…I like that…but I wonder if it doesn’t also include and require thinking…creative thinking, problem solving thinking, the thinking which results in integration and harmonization – critical thinking. Nothing much evolves, including one’s nature or character or one’s habits of response and reflex in life’s choices without thought and purpose.
Absolutely! Mind is the arena of choice (111:1). We cannot choose something unless we’re conscious of it. And to act without thinking, would be no better than living on the animal level of existence. It would require ignoring the mind’s reality recognition abilities and preferentially relying on reaction to external feelings and/or internal emotions (16:7.5).
(1216.4) 111:1.3 Material mind is the arena in which human personalities live, are self-conscious, make decisions, choose God or forsake him, eternalize or destroy themselves.
But mind is massive. There are many different levels of mind, each with their own urges. Mind levels function both consciously and unconsciously. Unconscious urges arise from both the superconscious level and the subconscious level. But the arena where decisions are made, where free-will choice acts, must be conscious.
I think free-will acts are best when divinely inspired. Inspiration can come from many sources; but the only inspiration with value, thus worth seeking, is inspiration which arises from the superconscious, where the Value-Sorter lives (196:3.17). And therein lies the dilemma. We are not conscious of the superconscious and the Value-Sorter, so how can we utilize it for the thoughts that guide decision making?
Mystical meditation taps the minefield of the subconscious. Worshipful meditation taps the mind-field of the superconscious. But what is it that makes the precious gems of the superconscious discoverable, recognizable and understandable? How does the mind decipher the difference between the coal discovered within the subconscious and the glittering jewels discovered within the superconscious? How does a balanced personality deal with both discoveries and still progress? I think it’s part of the psychic circles, which involve more than just mind and thinking. They involve the entire personality, all of self-hood.
(1209:3) 110:6.3 The psychic circles are not exclusively intellectual, neither are they wholly morontial; they have to do with personality status, mind attainment, soul growth, and Adjuster attunement. The successful traversal of these levels demands the harmonious functioning of the entire personality, not merely of some one phase thereof. The growth of the parts does not equal the true maturation of the whole; the parts really grow in proportion to the expansion of the entire self—the whole self—material, intellectual, and spiritual.
Here’s a partial list of the many ways the psychic circles are described in TUB:
1. Personality realization
2. Mortal potentiality
3. Cosmic growth
4. Comparative mortal maturity
5. Personality status, mind attainment, soul growth and Adjuster attunement
6. Balanced growth
7. Planetary progression
8. Human achievement
9. Self-understanding, self-conquest, and self-mastery
I like the idea of balanced growth. When describing the cosmic mind reality responses, we’re informed that the personality can become unbalanced if it does not coordinate and integrate all three levels of reality (16:6.10). We’re also told that a sense of proportion is necessary when making decisions because evil can come whenever the lesser is chosen in place of the greater (16:7.7). I think the implication is that the qualities of lesser and greater must be discerned, sought after, in order to maintain a balanced personality. Progress in such discernment would be indicative of persistent choices for the greater in lieu of the lesser, which would also indicate greater acumen of insight; keener attunement to reality; broader ability to master oneself; and a deeper desire to serve the universe. Isn’t that what the psychic or cosmic circles are all about?
Don’t the authors try to point out our evolving nature as a result of true religious experience? That moral social and economic development evolves along with this religious experience?
I think our evolving nature is the result of choosing truth, and truth itself is always a religious experience, or revelation (101:4.3). Religious experience is essentially God consciousness, the spiritual domain of the highest insight of the cosmic mind, the reverential and worshipful form of cosmic discrimination (16:6.8). It is the union of supreme values with cosmic meanings as a realization of universal reality (111:3.5).
But I agree that civilization evolves as a result of the creativity of the inner man.
(1220.2) 111:4.3 The advances of true civilization are all born in this inner world of mankind. It is only the inner life that is truly creative.
When worship and wisdom are lacking, civilization regresses (118:8.6). They say that social consciousness is not inalienable (16:9.4) Therefore, it seems to me that progressive civilization is dependent upon God consciousness which is inalienable. (I find it interesting that they use the same word Jefferson used when describing our so-called God-given rights.) We’re also told if the Adjusters all left the planet, our civilization would be functioning on very primitive levels (109:4.4).
I meant to bring up TUB’s definition of evolution earlier, which is creativity in time (105:6.5). Creativity in time is a partnership between creature and Creator. This is also how the evolution of the Supreme is described. It’s also how the psychic circles are described. Anyway, lots of thoughts on this subject . . .
“Religion, the conviction-faith of the personality, can always triumph over the superficially contradictory logic of despair born in the unbelieving material mind. There really is a true and genuine inner voice, that “true light which lights every man who comes into the world.” And this spirit leading is distinct from the ethical prompting of human conscience. The feeling of religious assur- ance is more than an emotional feeling. The assurance of religion transcends the reason of the mind, even the logic of philosophy. Religion is faith, trust, and assurance.”
This highlighted part caught my attention. I have thought about religion as “personal spiritual experience”
the authors don’t arbitrarily coin different phrases just to have fun.
conviction faith of the personality kind of takes us to the mind arena of choice as opposed to experience.
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