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Well, to make it as simple as possible, don’t you think prejudice has to do with thinking and moral cowardice has to do with acting? Thinking does lead to action, so prejudice definitely can influence action. But cowards don’t act, right? They don’t make that leap of faith. Presumably a coward’s failure to act is primarily due to fear, but there are other reasons too, such as laziness, indecision and indifference. Whether or not any of those reasons are motivated by prejudice I suppose is a personal matter. I think there are many different motivations behind the soul becoming frozen (failure to thrive).
Or perhaps moral cowards may act but primarily by peer pressure or social conformity? We fear to stand out and we fear being shunned so we’ll go along with the mob. Mob behavior is inexplicable….many members of a mob will go along with things they would not do without the mob. Thinking seems to sink to the lowest common denominator….clarity of thought, insight, discernment, and personal reflection flee so many in the mob that might otherwise be far more rational. An embarrassing level of social imitation perhaps?
I think this is illustrative of the teaching that evolutionary society and religion is a social/religious cultural brake or ballast to evolutionary progress while those leaders who dare to strive for right despite the social costs do manage to influence and appeal to others sufficiently to create new movement(s) for the imitation of others – the hero thing plays here too – to slowly bring evolutionary progress and change to the peer/social norms over time. Personally, many of us may admire behavior we won’t exhibit due to social norms and peer pressures to not stand out and that admiration eventually expresses itself as such norms slowly change.
But we study the personal experience now rather than the social and to become “frozen” in our spiritualization in one of the first 3 categories listed in 101:7.4 (the next quote in our sequential study) is not unusual to be sure! Which reminds me of:
110:7.6 (1213.1) But with the vast majority of Urantians the Adjuster must patiently await the arrival of death deliverance; must await the liberation of the emerging soul from the well-nigh complete domination of the energy patterns and chemical forces inherent in your material order of existence. The chief difficulty you experience in contacting with your Adjusters consists in this very inherent material nature. So few mortals are real thinkers; you do not spiritually develop and discipline your minds to the point of favorable liaison with the divine Adjusters. The ear of the human mind is almost deaf to the spiritual pleas which the Adjuster translates from the manifold messages of the universal broadcasts of love proceeding from the Father of mercies. The Adjuster finds it almost impossible to register these inspiring spirit leadings in an animal mind so completely dominated by the chemical and electrical forces inherent in your physical natures.
Interesting to note the first phrase above related to the survivor rates topic – the quote does NOT say “the vast majority of Urantians” who survive but simply the vast majority OF mortals from this world…hmmmm………….Anyway…..
My family tribe was always taught to think for ourselves and stand up for what’s right and do the right thing no matter how unpopular or difficult….but I can tell you this is not easy and I certainly have failed to meet such ideals countless times.
Remember Peter denying Jesus 3 times? Same issue I suppose? The need to fit in and not face ridicule or danger for one’s beliefs. Another issue of illumination by the courageous example of Jesus to stand up and be righteous no matter the cost – socially or personally.
Clear thinking and insight requires courage to deliver the fruit. So yes Bonita….I agree….cowardice means to not act or to act cowardly in conformity and often with what one even knows to be wrong or far less than what is right!!
143:1.7 (1608.4) “Today, the unbelievers may taunt you with preaching a gospel of nonresistance and with living lives of nonviolence, but you are the first volunteers of a long line of sincere believers in the gospel of this kingdom who will astonish all mankind by their heroic devotion to these teachings. No armies of the world have ever displayed more courage and bravery than will be portrayed by you and your loyal successors who shall go forth to all the world proclaiming the good news — the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of men. The courage of the flesh is the lowest form of bravery. Mind bravery is a higher type of human courage, but the highest and supreme is uncompromising loyalty to the enlightened convictions of profound spiritual realities. And such courage constitutes the heroism of the God-knowing man. And you are all God-knowing men; you are in very truth the personal associates of the Son of Man.”
The source of courage – the adjutants:
36:5.8 (402.5) 3. The spirit of courage — the fidelity endowment — in personal beings, the basis of character acquirement and the intellectual root of moral stamina and spiritual bravery. When enlightened by facts and inspired by truth, this becomes the secret of the urge of evolutionary ascension by the channels of intelligent and conscientious self-direction.
36:5.9 (402.6) 4. The spirit of knowledge — the curiosity-mother of adventure and discovery, the scientific spirit; the guide and faithful associate of the spirits of courage and counsel; the urge to direct the endowments of courage into useful and progressive paths of growth.
155:3.7 (1727.7) They learned that, when religion is wholly spiritual in motive, it makes all life more worth while, filling it with high purposes, dignifying it with transcendent values, inspiring it with superb motives, all the while comforting the human soul with a sublime and sustaining hope. True religion is designed to lessen the strain of existence; it releases faith and courage for daily living and unselfish serving. Faith promotes spiritual vitality and righteous fruitfulness.
The Real Nature Of Religion is the courage delivered by faith and the assurance of faith and truth realization to be guided by the Spirit within in all matters and to fear no social or personal costs in that loyalty.
101:7.4 (1114.2) The great difference between a religious and a nonreligious philosophy of living consists in the nature and level of recognized values and in the object of loyalties. There are four phases in the evolution of religious philosophy: Such an experience may become merely conformative, resigned to submission to tradition and authority. Or it may be satisfied with slight attainments, just enough to stabilize the daily living, and therefore becomes early arrested on such an adventitious level. Such mortals believe in letting well enough alone. A third group progress to the level of logical intellectuality but there stagnate in consequence of cultural slavery. It is indeed pitiful to behold giant intellects held so securely within the cruel grasp of cultural bondage. It is equally pathetic to observe those who trade their cultural bondage for the materialistic fetters of a science, falsely so called. The fourth level of philosophy attains freedom from all conventional and traditional handicaps and dares to think, act, and live honestly, loyally, fearlessly, and truthfully.
101:7.5 (1114.3) The acid test for any religious philosophy consists in whether or not it distinguishes between the realities of the material and the spiritual worlds while at the same moment recognizing their unification in intellectual striving and in social serving. A sound religious philosophy does not confound the things of God with the things of Caesar. Neither does it recognize the aesthetic cult of pure wonder as a substitute for religion.
101:7.6 (1114.4) Philosophy transforms that primitive religion which was largely a fairy tale of conscience into a living experience in the ascending values of cosmic reality.
8. Faith and Belief
101:8.1 (1114.5) Belief has attained the level of faith when it motivates life and shapes the mode of living. The acceptance of a teaching as true is not faith; that is mere belief. Neither is certainty nor conviction faith. A state of mind attains to faith levels only when it actually dominates the mode of living. Faith is a living attribute of genuine personal religious experience. One believes truth, admires beauty, and reverences goodness, but does not worship them; such an attitude of saving faith is centered on God alone, who is all of these personified and infinitely more.
Me here: It seems to me that the issues of cowardice, courage, and social imitation are related by this declaration about faith – faith becomes our motive and source of courage or it is more a belief system than a transformative and spirit led reason for living and way of living which true religion is and must be. One’s belief does not mold perspective or motive or choices….faith does.
When Jesus tells us that we have no need to fear uncertainties or even calamities or death or any other material suffering, he is teaching us that absolute faith in our care and destiny is fully assured by that faith and by the reality upon which such faith and truth assurances rest. It is not that bad things will not happen or that faith children are promised ease and leisure by such faith and truth – no, it is only that no matter how badly material things might go or become, there is a greater reality!! A reality with spiritual bedrock realities and certainties that overcomes all material uncertainties and temporal difficulties.
Spirit realities are the greater reality! And as our faith and truth assurance grows to embrace those greater realities and to dominate, mold, and shape our motives and decisions and actions with confidence….THEN does courage come and deliver us from all fear and the errors of immaturity and the uncertainty inherent in free will adventure!
The Real Nature Of Religion is sustaining and growing ASSURANCE and COURAGE to act with faith in our well being and care and destiny….and this is the example of The Master as described in the final paper of the Revelation – The Faith of Jesus (196).
Let’s consider again the list of “Salvation from…” for further consideration of how the spiritization of mind and the faith assurance and truth assurance of spiritualization affects us and changes our perspective:
101:6.9 (1112.5) 1. Salvation from material fetters….
101:6.10 (1112.6) 2. Salvation from intellectual bondage….
101:6.11 (1112.7) 3. Salvation from spiritual blindness….
101:6.12 (1113.1) 4. Salvation from incompleteness of self…..
101:6.13 (1113.2) 5. Salvation from self, deliverance from the limitations of self-consciousness…..
101:6.14 (1113.3) 6. Salvation from time….
101:6.15 (1113.4) 7. Salvation from the finite…..Me here: I think confidence and courage replaces fears and anxieties by such salvation and assurance of salvation!
I think this is illustrative of the teaching that evolutionary society and religion is a social/religious cultural brake or ballast to evolutionary progress while those leaders who dare to strive for right despite the social costs do manage to influence and appeal to others sufficiently to create new movement(s) for the imitation of others – the hero thing plays here too – to slowly bring evolutionary progress and change to the peer/social norms over time. Personally, many of us may admire behavior we won’t exhibit due to social norms and peer pressures to not stand out and that admiration eventually expresses itself as such norms slowly change.
This reminds me of the quote below where the fraternal competitive spirit is used to inspire behavior. I think it’s a step above imitation because it involves the motivation to become even better. That would be the more progressive attitude – much better than the complacency of mere imitation.
(312.5) 28:5.18 The Divine Counselors, to whom this order is attached, utilize them to reflect from one world to another the benefits to be derived from spiritual service. And by using the performances of the best to inspire and encourage the mediocre, these seconaphim contribute immensely to the quality of devoted service in the superuniverses. Effective use is made of the fraternal competitive spirit by circulating to any one world information about what the others, particularly the best, are doing. A refreshing and wholesome rivalry is promoted even among the seraphic hosts.
And this segues directly into the concept of salvation which requires more than the complacency of mere imitation. Salvation is more inspired than that because it opens the door to co-creativity. Survival is choosing to co-create one’s own destiny. Co-creation uncorks the bottle, so to speak, and saves us from all the limitations mentioned in the list. Recall that personality is not subject to the fetters of antecedent causation because it is relatively co-creative (112:05). Co-creativity is a personality partnership also known as sonship. Accepting sonship is a choice to co-create – creature personality with Creator pre-personality. It’s a beautiful thing which makes the entire grand universe potentially available. And the religion of Jesus is the Way.
8. Faith and Belief
101:8.1 (1114.5) Belief has attained the level of faith when it motivates life and shapes the mode of living. The acceptance of a teaching as true is not faith; that is mere belief. Neither is certainty nor conviction faith. A state of mind attains to faith levels only when it actually dominates the mode of living. Faith is a living attribute of genuine personal religious experience. One believes truth, admires beauty, and reverences goodness, but does not worship them; such an attitude of saving faith is centered on God alone, who is all of these personified and infinitely more.
101:8.2 (1114.6) Belief is always limiting and binding; faith is expanding and releasing. Belief fixates, faith liberates. But living religious faith is more than the association of noble beliefs; it is more than an exalted system of philosophy; it is a living experience concerned with spiritual meanings, divine ideals, and supreme values; it is God-knowing and man-serving. Beliefs may become group possessions, but faith must be personal. Theologic beliefs can be suggested to a group, but faith can rise up only in the heart of the individual religionist.
101:8.3 (1114.7) Faith has falsified its trust when it presumes to deny realities and to confer upon its devotees assumed knowledge. Faith is a traitor when it fosters betrayal of intellectual integrity and belittles loyalty to supreme values and divine ideals. Faith never shuns the problem-solving duty of mortal living. Living faith does not foster bigotry, persecution, or intolerance.
101:8.4 (1115.1) Faith does not shackle the creative imagination, neither does it maintain an unreasoning prejudice toward the discoveries of scientific investigation. Faith vitalizes religion and constrains the religionist heroically to live the golden rule. The zeal of faith is according to knowledge, and its strivings are the preludes to sublime peace.
Me here: I find the above text addresses many important elements regarding religion and faith. In prior discussion and posts of text, it is well established that faith comes to children and primitives and does so despite inaccurate and false beliefs or lack of knowledge or intelligence. Faith trumps knowledge and belief in spiritual progress. But in this knowing is imbedded an inherent inference – some who have faith become radicalized and prejudiced and narrow minded and bigoted and disloyal to the shared ideals of the golden rule and the universal brother/sisterhood of humanity. Faith can “falsify its trust” and become a traitor to the religionist and create religious zealots with far more zeal than love and understanding of universe realities.
So…faith can be misplaced and result in significant error and evil. It depends upon the ideals and loyalties it fosters within the believer.
I often wonder though if such misguided faith eventually results in greater growth and spiritual progress once knowledge is introduced, either in this life or the mansion worlds, than for those who become indifferent to the spirit or mindless and faithless secularists or materialists or mechanists? From the murderous John Brown and those who kill in the name of gods like him, from the beginning of time, if faith based on wrong beliefs and a lack of Godly ideals and disengaged from universe realities…does it still deliver circle progress and grow soul?
zeal
[zēl]NOUN
great energy or enthusiasm in pursuit of a cause or an objective.synonyms: passion · zealousness · committedness · ardor · love · fervor · fire · avidity · fondness · devotion · devotedness · enthusiasm · eagerness · keenness · appetite · taste · relish · gusto · vigor · energy · verve · zest · fervency · ardency
So what does…”The zeal of faith is according to knowledge, and its strivings are the preludes to sublime peace.”…mean? Again, I think, we are being taught the value of clear meanings by the factual presentation of the knowledge of universe realities by epochal revelation. Clearly, personal revelation is not a reliable method (or any kind of method at all) for the delivery of universe facts or knowledge. Our Adjutant circuit connection and TA and Spirit of Truth are not delivery mechanisms/systems of facts but of those factors of faith and truth….yearning, hunger, thirst, curiosity, spirit insight, the adventurous spirit, ambition, achievement, and related elements of the assurance of and relationship with God.
There is that which is related to the power of mind and the religious experience that can take the mind ‘off the rails’ and ‘into the ditch and weeds’ of being. Religion can be deviated from its intent I think….and it is not so mysterious how. False beliefs are not the cause I do not think for I believe the agents and agencies of faith and truth can overcome ignorance and inaccuracies. The cause is ignorance multiplied and amplified by mind poisons….anxiety, fear, anger, greed, hate, lust, doubt, insecurity, disappointment, etc.
Faith can become distorted and twisted by ingesting a diet of poison…..but does it remain effective and deliver its adherents to the ascension adventure still? I suspect so………..Evil is but temporal….and sin requires knowledge of one’s error and iniquity its knowing embrace….are religious zealots and radicals driven by fear and hate merely engaged in evil I wonder? Does such error contain or exhibit faith?
Not if its “living faith” according to the quote above. Ahhhhh….living faith. Indicates dead or decaying or not-living and not-growing faith. Still it is described as faith…..confusing issue for me….
There certainly are religious nuts whose beliefs motivate their acts and shapes their mode of living with certainty and conviction! We are taught above that certainty and conviction are not faith anymore than belief is….and yet…”Faith has falsified its trust when it presumes to deny realities and to confer upon its devotees assumed knowledge. Faith is a traitor when it fosters betrayal of intellectual integrity and belittles loyalty to supreme values and divine ideals.”
Very confusing…
Faith-trust exists only as a part of personal religious experience. It’s a relationship. When a person abuses this relationship with Deity, faith becomes impaired and untrustworthy. In reality it is no longer true faith but a species of disloyalty (traitor) and dishonesty (betrayal of integrity).
There is no such thing as faith without a personal relationship with Deity. Faith is a gift from Deity. You can’t have faith without Deity, the giver of the gift. If it’s not this personal relationship with Deity that motivates people, then it’s not faith . . . it’s something else . . . and what you call it doesn’t matter much, does it? Boil it down and it’s evil: aka, immaturity; mistake; error; incompleteness; imperfection; etc., etc..
101:8.1 (1114.5) Belief has attained the level of faith when it motivates life and shapes the mode of living. The acceptance of a teaching as true is not faith; that is mere belief. Neither is certainty nor conviction faith. A state of mind attains to faith levels only when it actually dominates the mode of living. Faith is a living attribute of genuine personal religious experience. One believes truth, admires beauty, and reverences goodness, but does not worship them; such an attitude of saving faith is centered on God alone, who is all of these personified and infinitely more.
The last two sentences of the above quote indicate that faith is an attribute of personal religious experience, in other words, a quality characteristic of the relationship which is centered only on God himself. Faith takes on the nature of that relationship between two persons. It does not matter that the Adjuster is a pre-person because he is altogether personal and personable.
101:8.2 (1114.6) Belief is always limiting and binding; faith is expanding and releasing. Belief fixates, faith liberates. But living religious faith is more than the association of noble beliefs; it is more than an exalted system of philosophy; it is a living experience concerned with spiritual meanings, divine ideals, and supreme values; it is God-knowing and man-serving. Beliefs may become group possessions, but faith must be personal. Theologic beliefs can be suggested to a group, but faith can rise up only in the heart of the individual religionist.
Here again, we’re told that faith is part of a living personal religious experience. In fact, the quote says it MUST be personal. Faith is God-knowing, not intellectually, but spiritually, person-to-person. The only way to know God personally is to find him and feel his presence within the soul, then share that inner life with him in a relationship (which actually is the soul).
Yes, it is possible to intellectually know OF God, and even ABOUT God, but to actually know him personally requires a relationship with him. As Jesus said, we are to increasingly feel the presence of God in our souls. When we know God in our souls there is a natural inner urge to increasingly strive to be more like him, to imitate his divine nature by doing his will.
Trying to be more like an idea OF God, or an idea ABOUT God, is false because it is not derived directly from a relationship with God himself, but with an intellectual idea of what he might be like rather than an actual experience of what he IS like. Yes, that idea may end up being grafted onto the true vine in some way, but it does not yield spiritual fruit, only social fruit. [Caps not meant to yell.]
There are many false grafts which appear to be evidence of faith, but are not. This is what they mean by falsehood being the outcome of a betrayal of faith-trust in the one’s personal relationship with God, and instead placing value on something that intellectually appears to be from God, but isn’t. Then there are those who hold so dearly to these ideas and claim moral superiority, that even they begin to believe their own falsehood is undeniably true such that everyone should accept it. That’s where it gets real dicey. Even Lucifer fell for that.
(1124.7) 102:6.5 Convictions about God may be arrived at through wise reasoning, but the individual becomes God-knowing only by faith, through personal experience.
(1221.2) 111:5.1 The doing of the will of God is nothing more or less than an exhibition of creature willingness to share the inner life with God — with the very God who has made such a creature life of inner meaning-value possible. Sharing is Godlike — divine. God shares all with the Eternal Son and the Infinite Spirit, while they, in turn, share all things with the divine Sons and spirit Daughters of the universes.
(1732.5) 155:6.12 It is not so important that you should know about the fact of God as that you should increasingly grow in the ability to feel the presence of God.
(1126.4) 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.
Our Adjutant circuit connection and TA and Spirit of Truth are not delivery mechanisms/systems of facts but of those factors of faith and truth….yearning, hunger, thirst, curiosity, spirit insight, the adventurous spirit, ambition, achievement, and related elements of the assurance of and relationship with God.
I think I understand what you’re saying here but aren’t the facts the facts? What I mean is, the facts of reality are always present awaiting discovery, recognition and interpretation. Facts don’t have to be delivered, as you say, but discovered, and the adjutants most certainly do participate in this fact finding process as part of the cosmic mind. The adjutants are our intelligence ministry; the first being the spirit of “quick understanding”. Understanding what? I say it’s understanding facts. Don’t forget that values are concealed within facts, which means that recognition of the reality of facts is the starting point. This is the role of the cosmic mind reality recognition ministry, of which the adjutants are a part. And isn’t all of this also a part of personal revelation? I think it has to be and I also think it is reliable provided these . . . “three basic factors in reflective thinking may be [are] unified and co-ordinated in personality development . . . ” (16:6.10).
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.
111:6.6 Science is the source of facts, and mind cannot operate without facts. They are the building blocks in the construction of wisdom which are cemented together by life experience. Man can find the love of God without facts, and man can discover the laws of God without love, but man can never begin to appreciate the infinite symmetry, the supernal harmony, the exquisite repleteness of the all-inclusive nature of the First Source and Center until he has found divine law and divine love and has experientially unified these in his own evolving cosmic philosophy.
Thanks Bonita….should have explained myself better! There are those who have claimed that the Spirit within (Adjutants, TA, and Spirit of Truth) delivers facts to the mortal mind, a suggestion that this is not a function of epochal revelation….that material and cosmological facts are delivered by personal revelation. Some have even suggested there is no need for epochal revelation or that its contents is not factual if it is not complete, absolute, and infallible. I don’t believe this is true. The spirit within is a revealer to be sure, but regarding facts I think is more of a sorter, integrator, interpreter, confirmer, evaluator, associater, and adjuster…of both truth and fact.
Does the Spirit within deliver material/scientific insights as well as spiritual/religious truths and insights? I think so yes. I think all forms of inspiration and insight comes from the ministry of some level of spirit delivered mind ministry. But insight and inspiration are more like connections and relationships of facts…not really facts in and of themselves…I think.
So, I think facts are either discovered by observation or by the gift of epochal revelation – including the Prince’s staff, the Garden, and subsequent revelations by Teacher and Magisterial Sons.
However, your last two posts have me questioning any prior certainty I might have had on the issue. The relationship with God within and God’s existence are facts as is our assurance of those realities! One’s religious experience is a fact…and not one of observation or of epochal revelation. So, what is the source of facts? 111:6.6 says science is the source. And I think it is the Spirit which helps us determine the meaning, relationship, and value of facts. 195:7.4 says values are concealed within the facts of phenomena. I remain somewhat confused on the topic.
But I am grateful for your patient and persistent light to help illuminate the truth and help me gain understanding.
But I am grateful for your patient and persistent light to help illuminate the truth and help me gain understanding.
Wait! I’m not an illuminator of truth. Holy Cow! Please don’t put that onus on me. All I meant by my last post was to dig deeper into the meaning you’re giving to some word symbols, because I think I have a slightly different set of meanings, but I’m not sure. Actually, we probably all have slightly different sets of meanings and I think that’s the way it’s supposed to be. Isn’t that how personal revelation works?
Anyway, I don’t think the spirit, of any sort, delivers facts to the mortal mind. There is no Spirit of Fact. The facts don’t really need delivering; what they need is discovering, real elbow grease. The responsibility is totally on the individual mind/personality to do the work of discovery (earned knowledge), while the adjutants provide the urges for that discovery. And in a loose sense, this is personal revelation because personal revelation involves wisdom. The adjutant of wisdom is an overlapping mind ministry which touches both the adjutants below and the Holy Spirit above. Wisdom is that middle reality reflex of cosmic mind which constantly struggles to achieve superadjutant insight.
So, I think it is quite possible that personal revelation is capable of producing the natural evolution of dominance of the individual personality, with or without epochal revelation, which is a gift for the planet as a whole. Don’t forget that the Holy Spirit functioned to enlarge human viewpoints of ethics, religion and spirituality long, long before any of the epochal revelations arrived on this planet (103:01). The two higher adjutants and the Holy Spirit are capable of participating in personal revelation, which is why I had a cow when Nigel called the Holy Spirit the Spirit of Fact. Facts are level one. Wisdom is level two. Spiritual insight is level three. The meanings and values discovered in all three must be integrated and unified by personality in order to advance along the psychic/cosmic circles of self-realization (aka personal revelation). The Holy Spirit is the supermind endowment necessary for this accomplishment. And how lucky are we that now we also have the Spirit of Truth and Thought Adjusters!! It’s pretty powerful stuff.
I do understand the problem of some folks thinking they have brand new revelations the world, and everyone in it, absolutely need to hear. This goes back to the post on falsified trust in the faith relationship. Recall the quote mentions conferring assumed knowledge on its devotees. This is one of those grafted situations where facts are either discovered and misinterpreted, or fabricated from the imagination. We know that faith is, ” . . . the inspiration of the spiritized creative imagination.” (132:3.5) But the important word is spiritized. Drawing upon a grafted non-spiritized creative imagination is both a betrayal of intellectual integrity and a traitor to the soul’s trust, where the relationship with spirit and its inspiration actually exists.
Such revelations are not legitimately inspired, although it is easy to be fooled. Being wise as a serpent requires a person to recognize the fact that things are not always what they appear to be. Grafted falsehoods may appear to be genuine, but the fruit tells us otherwise. Even so, some social fruit can be very enticing and convincing. The ability to reliably detect the difference comes from experience with all three levels of reality with increasing acuity for recognition of the reality reflex, which comes from a relationship with the most Real himself. And that there gives you tremendous assurance – that confidence in the ability to recognize reality and chose it.
So, what is the source of facts?
Doesn’t it say that God is the first truth and the last fact?
(1125.1) 102:6.6 Though reason can always question faith, faith can always supplement both reason and logic. Reason creates the probability which faith can transform into a moral certainty, even a spiritual experience. God is the first truth and the last fact; therefore does all truth take origin in him, while all facts exist relative to him. God is absolute truth. As truth one may know God, but to understand — to explain — God, one must explore the fact of the universe of universes. The vast gulf between the experience of the truth of God and ignorance as to the fact of God can be bridged only by living faith. Reason alone cannot achieve harmony between infinite truth and universal fact.
Hahahahaha….onus indeed! Apologies. But I find what I call triangulation – or the sharing of personal perspective and meanings by two or more people to be illuminating. Deeper and wider perspectives and definitions brings clarity to our sharing! The different lens offers new dimensions of view and new forms of contrast and context. Thanks for your contributions…which sometime are just a need for me to think deeper and consider my own expressions and explanations which also lead to better understanding. Where two or more are gathered…..
Speaking of discerning and concepts and the need for the Spirit ministry of assurance – both faith assurance and truth assurance – our personal assurance of survival and love – refer again to the post above about “Salvation from”:
10. Religion as Man’s Liberator
101:10.1 (1116.2) Intelligent man knows that he is a child of nature, a part of the material universe; he likewise discerns no survival of individual personality in the motions and tensions of the mathematical level of the energy universe. Nor can man ever discern spiritual reality through the examination of physical causes and effects.
101:10.2 (1116.3) A human being is also aware that he is a part of the ideational cosmos, but though concept may endure beyond a mortal life span, there is nothing inherent in concept which indicates the personal survival of the conceiving personality. Nor will the exhaustion of the possibilities of logic and reason ever reveal to the logician or to the reasoner the eternal truth of the survival of personality.
101:10.3 (1116.4) The material level of law provides for causality continuity, the unending response of effect to antecedent action; the mind level suggests the perpetuation of ideational continuity, the unceasing flow of conceptual potentiality from pre-existent conceptions. But neither of these levels of the universe discloses to the inquiring mortal an avenue of escape from partiality of status and from the intolerable suspense of being a transient reality in the universe, a temporal personality doomed to be extinguished upon the exhaustion of the limited life energies.
101:10.4 (1116.5) It is only through the morontial avenue leading to spiritual insight that man can ever break the fetters inherent in his mortal status in the universe. Energy and mind do lead back to Paradise and Deity, but neither the energy endowment nor the mind endowment of man proceeds directly from such Paradise Deity. Only in the spiritual sense is man a child of God. And this is true because it is only in the spiritual sense that man is at present endowed and indwelt by the Paradise Father. Mankind can never discover divinity except through the avenue of religious experience and by the exercise of true faith. The faith acceptance of the truth of God enables man to escape from the circumscribed confines of material limitations and affords him a rational hope of achieving safe conduct from the material realm, whereon is death, to the spiritual realm, wherein is life eternal.
101:10.4 (1116.5) It is only through the morontial avenue leading to spiritual insight that man can ever break the fetters inherent in his mortal status in the universe. . . . Mankind can never discover divinity except through the avenue of religious experience and by the exercise of true faith. . . .
The morontia avenue. What do you suppose that is? Is it the same as the avenue of religious experience? It apparently leads to spiritual insight and spiritual insight breaks fetters, in other words, provides the freedom of potential spirit existence. There is nothing in either fact or idea that can give us that freedom, but the morontia avenue can. How does that jive up with this next quote? Does relation have something to do with the morontia avenue?
196:3.2 There are just three elements in universal reality: fact, idea, and relation. The religious consciousness identifies these realities as science, philosophy, and truth. Philosophy would be inclined to view these activities as reason, wisdom, and faith — physical reality, intellectual reality, and spiritual reality. We are in the habit of designating these realities as thing, meaning, and value.
We’re told that Paradise values are concealed within the facts of time and space. Is it the morontia avenue that reveals those values? We’re also told that it’s our thoughts/ideas that lead us Godward, but obviously it’s not all thoughts or ideas. Could it be only those ideas within the morontia avenue that lead us Godward?
Hi Bonita and Bradley,
What a great exploration into this topic!
Bonita, regarding your question on “morontia avenue“, since morontia implies soul-level activity, maybe this avenue implies those actual unavoidable stages of morontial progress, from human tadpole to spirit frog? On the other hand, “religious experience” implies a state that can be experienced at any stage. This seems closely related to the fact that a seventh circler can experience love (and personal assurance) just as deeply as a first circler, despite the difference in their “stage”, or steps along that “morontia avenue“.
PS: regarding how our local down-stepped personalization of the Infinite Spirit (Divine Minister) might be seen as serving as Spirit of Fact (complementing her beloved as “Spirit of Truth”) my cow-birthing recycling of that curious term had to do with what you just described as our “increasing acuity for recognition of the reality reflex“. In other words, insight into the way things really are (facts of reality) as made accessible (discoverable) by the three cosmic intuitions, which are in turn made (beautifully and appropriately!) accessible by our local universe “foster mother”.
I’ve not read through the whole of this excellent thread, so this is just a response to the last few posts.
with thanks — Nigel
PS: regarding how our local down-stepped personalization of the Infinite Spirit (Divine Minister) might be seen as serving as Spirit of Fact . . .
Hey there Nigel. Thanks for chiming in. I thought you originally said the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Fact?
Welcome Nigel!! I agree with you and Bonita….the way or avenue of religious experience is also the “morontia avenue” I think. As we consider “liberation” and “salvation from” the “fetters” of materialism and the animal nature, all are linked by the religious experience which loosens the fetters of that experience which is not religious in scope or scale or truth. It is The Real Nature of Religion of the Religion In Human Experience that is the experience of the soul and the growth of soul and the progress of the soul, or spiritualization of the soul, that is described here as the moronita avenue….the soul being the mortal’s equivalent of morontia mind….and being able to grow and act independently of mortal mind.
And I agree that soul experience is available to and experienceable by children, primitives, and the experienced/wise…all levels of circle progress can and do have religious experience. After study in these middle papers, I am becoming more convinced that much of religious experience that is related to faith, spirit response, faith assurance, personal revelation, truth assurance, and circle progress is not truly so attached to factual reality or true belief or any knowledge based on fact or truth – but, rather, Religion In Human Experience has far more to do with this morontia avenue in tadpoles and those far distant yet from Light and Life and far from the centers of celestial leadership and example of celestial teachers and examples in the earlier mortal epochs.
I think what’s being described to us here is a systemic ministry of great power and effect…and while it may not and does not preclude or manipulate free will, it certainly does naturally create a feedback loop of yearn, hunger, and thirst and the delivery of that which ONLY can ease and satisfy those in return…as natural as a baby finds the nipple and nurses I think. And the growth of the spirit relationship is like the mother nourishing the babe, the naturalness and normal ease of this relationship of the suckled and the giver of life and hope – the assurance of safety and survival. The birth of the soul does not require intellect or education or knowledge…it only requires a response to our inner and true nature – the spiritized nature of self.
And yet….facts and knowledge are required of mind…so required the mind will invent them if necessary. And material facts can easily overwhelm our mind’s attention and become a distraction and force which materializes our priorities and perspective – also quite naturally. The dual nature. Proper material education helps harmonize both of our dual natures…but who gets “proper” material education? Materialism so often comes with its many “fetters” and forms of spirit blindness and deafness. Interestingly, the yearn and the hunger and thirst for righteousness does not diminish I do not think so much as our attention to it does. We become so distracted by materialism and the pursuit of pleasure and the distraction from suffering, that we identify more and more with materialism and physical life than we identify with the spirit and spiritized life.
And so is the value of celestial example and epochal revelation made plain – the benefits of the knowledge of reality helps us mortals identify our source, destiny, purpose, meanings, and values of self and being and becoming and helps us to more knowingly and deliberately redirect and transfer the seat of our identity and loosen the material fetters and seek salvation from materialism to experience the growth of the branch which was so naturally and expertly grown from and attached to the vine so long ago by the Mother Spirit with her faith assurances and nourishment of our infancy in the Spirit! The more we choose the spirit way and morontia avenue, the more habitual such choices become and which delivers the fruit!
100:1.8 (1095.3) Religious habits of thinking and acting are contributory to the economy of spiritual growth. One can develop religious predispositions toward favorable reaction to spiritual stimuli, a sort of conditioned spiritual reflex. Habits which favor religious growth embrace cultivated sensitivity to divine values, recognition of religious living in others, reflective meditation on cosmic meanings, worshipful problem solving, sharing one’s spiritual life with one’s fellows, avoidance of selfishness, refusal to presume on divine mercy, living as in the presence of God. The factors of religious growth may be intentional, but the growth itself is unvaryingly unconscious.
100:1.9 (1095.4) The unconscious nature of religious growth does not, however, signify that it is an activity functioning in the supposed subconscious realms of human intellect; rather does it signify creative activities in the superconscious levels of mortal mind. The experience of the realization of the reality of unconscious religious growth is the one positive proof of the functional existence of the superconsciousness.
What are the differences, if any, between soul, morontia avenue, and superconscious related to The Real Nature of Religion? I notice above it says the factors of religious growth MAY be intentional and so they may…but don’t these Papers teach us that not all factors of religious growth are intentional and cognitive of the material mind? There is a natural circuitry of ministry which delivers the thirst and the milk to us as spirit babes and children regardless of our own intentionalality! I think our personal intent to spiritualize and grow by motive, intention, priority, and person choice is that moment of being “born again”. We can not be born again until and unless we are already born…and that is a natural birth which does not depend upon our cognition and choice but is solely in the hands of Mother.
I believe the Holy Spirit and her overlap with the adjutant of wisdom is actually the morontia avenue to soul consciousness. It’s the only avenue for the discovery of new and true meanings for old facts, those facts originally discerned by the material mind intellect. We’re told that wisdom can only be achieved when facts are adjusted to ideals. Ideals are discovered in the soul so there must be an avenue to that morontia level which all of us have access to at any stage in circle progress. Circle progress merely enhances the capacity to discover, recognize, interpret and choose this morontia avenue gift.
The beginning of the morontia avenue may be material, but the end is morontial. There is never an abrupt transition in mind ministry. The spirit of wisdom provides the material beginning of the avenue, the Holy Spirit of the soul provides the morontia end of the avenue, and the purpose of the avenue is adjustment of material ideas into morontia ideas. Another name for it might be spiritual insight. It’s all part of the circle of bringing material facts to the morontia level of reasoning where they are adjusted, then back into the material world – the elliptical symmetry of all reality. The Holy Spirit’s role isn’t so much about the facts themselves, but about ideas being transformed by ideals, by meanings and values.
130:4.10 The eye of the material mind perceives a world of factual knowledge; the eye of the spiritualized intellect discerns a world of true values. These two views, synchronized and harmonized, reveal the world of reality, wherein wisdom interprets the phenomena of the universe in terms of progressive personal experience.
The morontia level of the soul itself does not function in the material world except by the changed attitude and character of the material mind which has occurred through the morontia level experience – aka, personal religious experience/personal revelation. The Holy Spirit provides the arena of supermind and the presence of spirit personality ministry from whom ideals and values can be discerned, and with whom personal revelation can potentially be experienced since it is relational. She can’t be offering facts to the hungry soul; the soul feeds on relational value, not facts. Facts are the fuel for the material mind, therefore the Holy Spirit cannot be the Spirit of Fact. If she were, she would reside in the material mind rather than the soul, in which case there would be no soul – no supermind, no superadjutant goal.
Instead, I think the Holy Spirit offers a soul-level relational experience of value which adds new and higher meaning to facts through the adjustment of ideas to match ideals. She can do this even without the Spirit of Truth, but when he shows up, along with Adjuster, the effect is logarithmically enhanced . . . three persons offering relational experience in the search for concealed value in facts is so much more symmetrical and stable than only one.
I think the Holy Spirit is much holier than just facts alone. She is the Spirit mind-presence of the soul, the spiritualized intellect. Doesn’t Spirit mind-presence reveal all three levels of reality – facts, ideas and relations – from a spiritual perspective? I think the Spirit of Fact moniker does her a great disservice. It cheats her out of participation with the rest of reality and denies her participation in providing the spiritual perspective of all reality to her creatures.
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