In this exposé, any allusion to a religion or a church has for background the Catholic church, because this author has been raised in the religious atmosphere of christianism and is aware of the many setbacks it has suffered and the limitations it has imposed on the faithful throughout the centuries. However, the exposé itself could apply as well to Judaism, Islamism or any other of the great religions of the world who have transformed their doctrine into a tool of power and materialism, and belittled their flock to the rank of servile worshippers of a God that only wants to serve them.
I address this message most particularly to those Christians who use the Bible as a supreme authority in all matters of life and all those who misuse its teachings to judge and even condemn their fellowman.
The last age, the Age of Pisces, has seen the advent of the greatest teacher in the history of mankind. His incarnation occurred at a time when, in the middle of a decadent humanity, there was a great yearning on the part of many for a deeper understanding of life. Thus, Jesus came into a world that was ready for a transformational process that would require the participation of many other teachers and masters, and would take two thousand years to unfold and take root in the mind of the individuals incarnating and reincarnating in that Age.
Jesus' contemporaries were still in the kindergarten of spirituality, and many of them found it outrageous that one of their own dared challenge a religious system based on Moses' teachings. Needless to say that the mission of Jesus was nearly an impossible one, as he was up against a patriarchal religiosity that considered the Deity as a God of wrath and vengeance that loved His children, but was quite willing to destroy those that did not obey His laws or threatened His chosen people. Therefore, their moral standards were based on very rigid principles that had nothing to do with love and compassion, and customs that would nowadays be outlawed by the Human Rights Associations. Punishments like stoning were common practice and applied to adultery as well as blasphemy. Sacrifices of animals were the highlight of temple services and brought a considerable amount of money in the coffers of the priests.
In spite of all this, Jesus was not about to start a crusade against the priests and the Sanhedrin. He had learned his lesson when he threw the merchants out of the temple, and he inwardly knew that it would take quite a long time to root out what was considered a divine legacy, handed down from generation to generation by their forefathers. Thus, his teachings would gradually evolve into a more inward spirituality and a more humane doctrine with regards to the brotherhood of man. Just as children play with toys to learn the first rudiments of life, so would the rites, icons, prayers and ceremonies practiced in the times of Jesus, be used as symbols representative of the spiritual truths he had unveiled during his ministry. The mass would be a sign of the oneness of creation and the tabernacle, an outward representation of the God that resides in the temple of the body. Raised as they had been in the thought of sin and the fear of the wrath of God, mankind would learn to know a very different and more approachable God, a God of love and compassion, a Father that loves equally all His children. Thuis was not the ideal way to progress onward, but it was nevertheless what the humanity of that age needed at that stage of their evolution.
Therefore, even though his beliefs were challenged by the priests and the Sanhedrin, Jesus tried to convey, through parables, direct teachings and so-called miracles, the ultimate truths he had himself discovered and unfolded from within during a short but fruitful life on earth:
We are immortal beings, here and now.
The physical body is a self-regenerating unit that can heal itself.
We are the gods of creation.
That we are immortal beings here and now, that, in fact, all living things are immortal, is the most profound and gratifying truth ever presented to mankind. The idea of a soul that lives after death had been at the root of most religions, but being immortal beings here and now, gave us a new lease on life: from that day, each entity incarnating into the world, could, at any time, claim his or her birthright to transform and raise the vibrations of that body and become a multidimensional traveler of the cosmos.
That the body is a self-regenerating unit and can heal itself is a truth that manifests itself everyday of our life. We are unaware of the marvels of that body and the miracles it does in spite of our erroneous beliefs with regards to the functioning of its many organs and the way we treat it in our everyday life. The fact that we are still alive amidst the pollution, wrong eating habits and viruses of all kinds, shows that the body can adjust itself to any condition providing we keep our mind centered on that ultimate fact of life: we are all brothers and sisters of the cosmos; life is love, this meaning that, without that inner sense of love for all humanity, the total self, body, soul and spirit, cannot come into the balance needed to have a healthy and perfect body. Jesus did not accomplish miracles. He was only applying natural laws innate in each of us, imprinting on the subject's mind the idea of perfection, and that's all the cells needed to regenerate themselves and return the body to a state of perfection.
It took a long time, but that truth has made its way in the deepest regions of the spirit and mind, and at the dawn of this 3rd millenium, the time has come to harvest what has been planted in the past 2000 years. We came into the world with the most sophisticated and self-reliant machine ever created. In whatever condition it comes at birth, still it is a perfect body, only awaiting a word from its owner, to grow back its original form, that of perfection.
True to its role of vehicle for the spirit and soul, and ever obedient to its master, that body may become a horn of plenty for those that understand the concept of love, or a source of sufferings and limitations for those that have gone astray on the road to perfection.
As it is relevant to your present way of life, think of yourself as the most perfect computer there is, with the most sophisticated repair tool at your disposal. In a computer, the Disk First Aid kit will, at the click of a button, automatically repair whatever clogs the machine and prevents its good functioning. It is exactly the same with the human body, with this exception that, because of the conditionings we have been exposed to from birth and the errors of the past, we have not yet learned how to control and make use of a tool that can radically change the form we are into a sane and perfect body. You can believe or deny all this, but the fact is that man is the one who created the computer and its Disk First Aid, and it is logical to suppose that the creator had the wisdom to do the same with His own creations.
This Disk First Aid remains latent in the human form until the time we activate it. The healing process can take place at any time and in any circumstances, whether it is cancer, aids or any other disease that plague mankind at the present time. The healing is activated on the etheric level and transpose itself on the physical form. It is a realignment of the electrical system of the body as well as a regeneration of the cells that allow them to heal themselves and by the same token the body, thus performing their own mission of life. It is the simple but arduous process of reestablishing contact with the Source, thus balancing the body, mind and spirit and walking towards the ultimate goal of our mission of life.
Finally, that we are the gods of creation,that is, sons and daughters of God with the power and attributes of God, is a truth that brought Jesus before Caiaphas who questioned him:
" The high priest said to him, "I charge you under oath by the living God: Tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God.Yes, it is as you say," Jesus replied. "But I say to all of you: In the future you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming on the clouds of heaven. (Matt. 26:63 - MacBible 2.0 Zondervan Corp. ) Even though some bibles will differ slightly from this one, alll the excerpts will be from that electronic source.
With this reply, Jesus was foreseeing the destiny of all mankind (the son of man) thus being true to his own teachings when he affirmed:
I and the Father are one(John 10: 30)
Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me. (John 14: 11)
Don't you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.(John 14: 12)
One must remember that the words of Jesus were interpreted and translated many times. Although of good faith, the translators used what they thought were the best words to translate the teachings and the essence of Jesus' words. Jesus never tried to focus the attention on his person, and I do not visualize the Master boosting, Whoever believes in meor again I will do this or that...Jesus never dissociated himself from the Father. He always attributed his powers to the God Within, as shown in this excerpt of the same gospel,
I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life. (John 5: 24)
Thus, when he replied he was the Son of God, Jesus was just reaffirming the universal truth that all mankind is ONE. He was at the same time proclaiming his own divinity and that of all his brothers and sisters of the universe. This is why he said that we would do even greater things than he did during his ministry, because, being himself somewhat restrained by the unbelief and intolerance of his own people with regards to his teachings and miracles, as you may know, he did not perform many miracles in his own village, he was foreseeing the dawn of a new spiritual age when these so-called miracles would become common knowledge and practice.
Unfortunately, christianity chose not to go deeper into those specific teachings of the Master, probably because they did not understand the true meaning of the words. True to Jesus' words, the Apostles did a few miracles, but that was not enough, because the true miracle was to touch the heart and spirit of the faithful, and there open the inner doorways to the Light. Many centuries would pass before the sons of God dare to see the vision and manifest the power and attributes that are theirs by birthright.
Three factors contributed in relegating the teachings of the Master in the background:
The Old Testament,
The Acts of the Apostles
The businesslike hierarchical struture of religions and their materialistic approach to spirituality.
The Old Testament is the relation of all that occurred before the coming of Jesus. For the most part, it is the story, the feat of arms, the cry for help of a people who constantly fought one against the other and quite frequently against other nations. It is also a constant interaction, intermixed with praises and petitions, between a community who thought they were a 'chosen people' and a God who granted favors and did not hesitate to crush those who dared attack his people.
The first book, Genesis, is the beginning of that story which, according to the book, began more than seven milleniums ago, with the appearance of the first man and woman, Adam and Eve and their descendants. That is not exactly how and when it occurred, because it is now known that the first inhabitants of earth appeared millions of years ago, and not an approximate 7,500 years as it has been related. The book relates the story of Israel from Adam to Jacob, with the well-known story of Jacob's son, Joseph, who was sold by his brothers and taken in Egypt, where he was taken in charge by the king who later made him governor of that country.
The Hebrews were worshippers of a God of wrath and vengeance, and their social and religious life were based on those principles. Their laws, rigid and sometimes inhumane, were all the more implacable since they believed they came from God. In a strong position because of those laws, the exercise of patriarcal authority gave rise to abuses and the head of the family (or clan), could, as he pleased, chastise or dispose of the members in his care and this, in spite of the illogicality and inhumanity of his decision. An example of this is found in the following story of Sodom, where we find Lot adressing two strangers whom he believed to be angels, and inviting them to his house. They finally accept and during the night, the men of Sodom surround the house:
They called to Lot, "Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so that we can have sex with them." Lot went outside to meet them and shut the door behind him and said, "No, my friends. Don't do this wicked thing. Look, I have two daughters who have never slept with a man. Let me bring them out to you, and you can do what you like with them. But don't do anything to these men, for they have come under the protection of my roof." (Genesis 19: 5-8)
Even though Lot believed they were angels, what kind of a father was he to sacrifice his own children. In fact, he and the other leaders were so mixed up in their beliefs and so inconsistant with their religious laws that they could prostitute their daughters to be hospitable and lapidate the same daughter if she ever slept with another man out of wedlock. Just imagine the consequences if a perverse pastor or preacher uses such teachings to his own ends!
Exodus is a repertoire of the religious and civil laws that were put in place after the return of Moses from Mt. Sinaï. It also relates the departure of the Hebrew people from Egypt where they were kept in bondage by the Pharaoh. All through the book, there is that interrelationship between God and his people, the Hebrews, and as expected, it is a still a God of wrath and vengeance who does not hesitate to destroy other nations to save His own people. The events that preceded the exodus and the seven plagues of Egypt show that Moses must have had very powerful allies, extraterrestrial or otherwise, because the God that Jesus talks about in the Gospels would never bring plagues on a country to save a specific nation, be it the Hebrew people. God is the God of all and did not, does not, and will not favor anyone in particular, in whatever frame of time or dimensional level one may be. Never would He approve of the atrocities the upholders of the Bible appear to be very comfortable with:
Anyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death. (Exodus 21: 17)
If a man takes a stick and beats his slave, whether male or female, and the slave dies on the spot, the man is to be punished. But if the slave doesn't die for a day or two, the master is not to be punished. The loss of his property is punishment enough. (Exodus 21: 20) Put to death any woman who practices magic. (Exodus 22: 18)
Put to death any man who has sexual relations with an animal. (Exodus 22: 19)
Condemn to death anyone who offers sacrifices to any God except to me, the Lord. (Exodus 22: 20 )
If I understand the extent of Exodus 21:20, a man had but to beat a slave just enough for him to survive a few days and he was off the hook! Talk about a masochistic God! As to the laws on death penalty, they have been responsible for the holy crusades and the Inquisition where, acting as inquisitors and judges, cruel, ignorant and intolerant priests, tortured and condemned to death, or to be burned at the stake, all those who did not make a profession of faith in the catholic God. Such outdated and inhumane laws are also responsible for the witch hunt that occurred in various places of Europe and, more recently, in Salem USA, at the end of the seventeenth century. They are also responsible for the religious wars of the last centuries, and it will be so until the time when humanity fully understands the true nature of the Energy we call God.
Leviticus continues in the same vein, with an emphasis on worship and religious ceremonies of the Hebrew people. Even though the book extolls the Holiness of God, it is nevertheless tainted with biases, such as the sacrifice of animals, a pronounced poaranoia of sin, the death punishment for adultery and so on, all this, of course, by God's order:
The LORD said to Moses and Aaron, Speak to the Israelites and say to them: `When any man has a bodily discharge, the discharge is unclean. Whether it continues flowing from his body or is blocked, it will make him unclean. (Leviticus 15: 1)
If anyone curses his father or mother, he must be put to death. He has cursed his father or his mother, and his blood will be on his own head.
If a man commits adultery with another man's wife --with the wife of his neighbor --both the adulterer and the adulteress must be put to death.
If a man sleeps with his father's wife, he has dishonored his father. Both the man and the woman must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.
If a man sleeps with his father's wife, he has dishonored his father. Both the man and the woman must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads. (Leviticus 20: 9-12)
And the list goes on until the family tree is all exhausted. Evolution is a slow process and we learn from our mistakes. These are the necessary lessons of life that have to be learned no matter what, where and when. What really baffles me is that two millenia after the departure of Jesus, the heads of churches did not find it necessary to make a thorough cleanup and remove from the Old Testament whatever does not correspond to Jesus' teachings Didn't they find it strange that a God who has so much to do and care for in the whole creation, should concern Himself with such amenities as the discharge of a penis! That such incongruities found their place in Christianity could be put, at best, on the count of negligence, but that they remained in the Bible for so long cannot be excused. Christian churches will have to answer for deliberately leaving in a book they call the book of God, and attributing to His will, barbarous customs and rules of conduct that have misled the faithful and has led to abuse and misconduct on the part of gullible and sometimes pervert people. Would that mean that, once again and just like the Hebrews, we have literally created a personal God, molded in our image and our resemblance?
The law of an eye for an eye goes back to the same Hebrew scriptures and it was taught in the times of Jesus.
If anyone injures another person, whatever he has done shall be done to him! If he breaks a bone, one of his bone shall be broken. If he blinds him in one eye, one of his eyes shall be blinded. (Leviticus 24: 19)
How many crimes have been committed in the name of that law, nobody knows, but one thing is certain, it was not God's law and Jesus himself said implicitely,
If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. (Luke 6:29)
It is most disconcerting to find two opposite viewpoints in the same book of God. Now who is the true God, the God of the Hebrews who blinds people, or the God of Jesus who asks us to turn the other cheek?
Numbers is the continuation of Leviticus, and it relates the will of a people to survive during the 40 years it took to reach the promised land. Not much improvement in the religious life of a people that still clings to its biases and erroneous beliefs. It seems to me that Hebrews' religious life was so intertwined with their moral and social behavior that they were to that stage in their evolution where any law they made became the law of God. Therefore, anything that occurred in their life was either a reward from God or the consequence of His wrath. Their rites, sacrifices of animals and cruel and inhumane punishments, all bore the stamp of God and were performed or executed in His name. This went so far that the leaders were able to fight their wars in the name of God and claim later on that it was Him that made them victorious.
Deuteronomy gives us an idea of the religious and social life under the leadership of Moses. It gives a complete description of the rules that were to govern Israel up to the times of Jesus. Most of these rules were very primitive and God was still there to back up whatever law was promulgated in His name.
If two men are having a fight and the wife of one tries to help her husband by grabbing hold of the other man's genitals, show her no mercy: cut off her hand!!! (Deut.25:11)
Why her hand, and why not his genitals?
If a man is caught having intercourse with another man's wife, both of them are to be put to death.Deut.22:22)
And here is a good one:
No man who has been castrated or whose penis has been cut off, may be included among the Lord's people. No one born out of wedlock or any descendant of such a person, even in the tenth generation, may be included among the Lord's people. (Deut.23: 1-2)
So when the Lord your God has given you the land and made you safe from all your enemies, be sure to kill all the Amalekites, so that no one will remember them any longer. Do not forget! (Deut.25: 19)
As you can see, nothing much has changed since the Exodus, and it is still very much the reign of a God of wrath and anger. Now, I am asking all good christian who live their life by this same Old Testament if there is a God that would approve of such atrocities. If there is, it is certainly not my God! The true God is a benevolent one who loves us all and would not do harm to any of his children. It is a God that does not judge nor punish because he is there, within each of His children. He is, in fact, the cause and the effect of all that occurs in His creation.
Without passing judgment on the spiritual value of the Deuteronomy or any other book of the Old Testament, it is obvious that those books belong to bygone days, a primitive way of life that has nothing to do with the evolved societies we have become. These people were not evil. They were ignorant men, uninformed of the spiritual laws that govern the cosmos. They were at the dawn of a spirituality that was limited to blind faith and total submission to the God they had themselves created, and whose wrath is equalled only by His power of destruction. Their belief system built on such a negative basis, it became easy for the Hebrews to transpose this intolerance of their God in their life, under cover of so-called divine laws that they blindly complied to, without regard for the consequences of their actions. They were quite relieved that their God would take on His shoulders the responsibility of whatever occurred in their life and, of course, the burden of the punishments executed in conformity with those laws. In their time period, such punishments were probably considered as quite normal, but the fact of finding the same teachings in a Bible of our 21st century is an anachronism and a disturbing fact that can hardly be swept under the carpet.
From the Book of Joshua to that ofEsther, the Old Testament relates many events of the long journey that led the Hebrew people to the promised land, the Israelite invasion of Canaan under the leadership of Joshua, the fall of Jericho, the stories about the exploits of national heroes called the Judges, most of whom were military leaders such as Samson, and the beginnings of the Israelite monarchy of which king David was the most renowned. It was a period of constant struggle, fighting, and of course, God was always there, on the side of the Hebrews,
That night, an angel of the Lord went to the Assyrian camp and killed 185,000 soldiers. At dawn the next day, there they lay, all dead! (2.Kings 19: 35)
That must have been a very powerful and deadly flying saucer, for sure!!! And yet, this is much more believable than a God of all mankind, of all people, going out of his way to kill 185,000 of his children to please the Hebrews! Think about it!
After leafing through the first 500 pages of the Old Testament, the Book of Job is the first one that has, in my viewpoint, true spiritual value. The previous ones may have some value, but it is submerged in the waves of worship of the Hebrews and weakened by the inhumanity of laws they ascribe to the will of God.
The book of Job is the allegorical story of a good man who suffers total disaster. He loses all his children and property and is afflicted with a repulsive disease. He cannot understand how God can let so much evil happen to one like himself, and he boldly challenges Him. Then, humbly acknowledging God as wise and great, he repents and is restored to his former condition with even greater prosperity than before. The book is, in fact, the story of mankind that Jesus related in The Story of the Lost Son (Luke 15:11). It is the story of the lost Paradise where man had access to God's power of creativity and all the good things in His Kingdom. After the Fall that stripped him of his divine powers of creator, man began, through hard work, pain and sufferings, the long journey that will eventually drive him back to his Father's house where, following the example of Job, he will regain his lost Paradise.
The Psalms is a book of praise to the Deity, a cry for help of a people in constant distress, and an admission of total submission to a God they respected and feared at the same time. There are of course, a few spiritual truths, such as Psalms 8: 1-9, that filter through, but they are buried in the endless stream of praises and lamentations that never seem to end. It reminds me of the Litanies - of praises and lamentations - recited in a monotonous tone during the sunday Vesters of the middle 20th century.
The Book of Proverbs is what it says, proverbs about life in general. Solomon's proverbs should be read as he is the one who so cleverly settled a dispute between two women who claimed to be the mother of a child. In his wisdom, he offered to cut the child in two, to which the true mother refused, as she preferred to lose her son than have him killed. The book is a wealth of advice on all activities of life. It dissociates itself from the previous ones, and although the God of vengeance still filters through, it is a breath of fresh air compared to the previous ones.
Ecclesiastes is a pragmatic and philosophical view of life. It is a look at society from a perspective that leaves aside religiosity to dig deep into people's motivation, needs and their search for happiness. It has an epicurian flavor, (So I am convincved that a man should enjoy himself, because the only pleasure in life is eating and drinking and enjoying himself. Ecc.8: 15)but it is still good wisdom for the most part. Above all, it is short and sweet and good reading!
The Song of Songs must be the first erotic book ever written. It looks as though it was written as a play where two lovers sing their love for each other. It is well written and it is beautiful. It is not exactly what I would call a religious book, but after reading Exodus, Leviticus and the likes, I must say it is refreshing and much less damageable. The Song of Songs teaches love, the greatest of all spiritual laws.
The book of Isaiah is named after that prophet, although he probably did not write it. Isaiah is the first of a long list of prophets that lived up to the times of Jesus. As I mentioned before, the problem in all this is that the Hebrews, the 'people of God', did not seem to have a mind of their own. Or rather, it looks as though they couldn't or wouldn't take responsibility for whatever occurred in their life. Be it the laws they promulgated, the wars they fought or the mistakes they made, God was always there in the forefront, taking credit or responsibility for whatever blessing or catastrophy that fell in their lap. Hence the many references to a God of wrath and vengeance we find throughout the Old Testament, and whether it is an encouragement, a warning or a threat, it is seen as coming from God: The Lord said... or God has ordered...God will protect His people... God will destroy the enemy of His people... Unless you do that, I will.. etc...
Isn't it strange that from the times of Jesus to our days, that (physical) interchange between God ans His people has practically ceased to exist. There may have been apparitions such as The Lady of Fatima, but none of those claimed to be from God Himself. It looks as though the Hebrew people could be the only one that ever claimed direct contact with God in such an extensive way. This said, there is quite a margin between a God that looks after the welfare of a people and one that worries about whether a penis ejaculates or not. All in all, I am quite ready to believe one of two things: either those stories were part of a folklore that was embellished and amplified to serve the cause of the leaders and the priests, or that God came straight out of a flying saucer (probably the one I mentioned above,) and began interfering in that people's personal affairs. No true christian can believe that those laws were written by God and those atrocities the consequence of his wrath.
Jesus was the first true prophet that really understood that interrelationship with the Father, and the first who saw God as the Father of all and not only the Father of the Hebrew people. He was a prophet too, but he had no warnings to give and no favors to bestow on his people. And here, I am not saying that the prophets of old were not true prophets. They had a gift of precognition and probably received messages from beyond as it happens nowadays, but that does not mean those messages were all from what we call the higher dimensions of life, or God. One must remember that, most of the time, a prophet receives his messages through symbols and interprets them to the best of his knowledge and abilities. Nowadays, if a psychic receives a message, he will say, I was told that...or They tell me that..,but in the mind of a people who were convinced they had with the Father a relationship no other people had, any message they received from beyond couldn't be from any other than God.
From Isaiah to Jesus, we find 17 prophets, the last one being Malachi that appeared sometime in the 5th century B.C. Most of them were, to some extent, prophets of doom, for Israel was constantly at war with the surrounding nations (it is still going on) and they had no success in convincing them to stop that nonsense, all the more since these same prophets did not hesitate to give them divine advice on how to win their wars. Therefore, their teachings were lost in the maze of primitive creeds and biases and the din of all these wars that were fought in the name of God.
As such, the books of the Prophets have not much intrinsic spiritual value, because they too, present God as the Father of a special people, the Hebrews. They imply that all countries, in fact, all people that were against them were against God. That was before the times of Jesus, of course, but it is fallacies like these that led christian religions to believe that theirs was the only true religion and their God, the only true God. Furthermore, the God Israel had literally created for its own purposes, gave no alternative to the Hebrew people: it was a relationship of servile obedience, total submission and egotistic worship. Servile obedience and total submission, because of the fear He inspired, and egotistic worship because they thought He was on their side and, of course, they were constantly petitioning and asking for favors. They were primitive in their faith and childish in their approach, and therefore they were quick to abandon that God when he did not grant what they were asking for.
Now, all that precedes is in the Bible, presumed to originate from God, and it is the bedside book of millions of good people who do not hesitate to live their life according to rules and directives they found in the Old Testament. If I remember correctly and I may be wrong, the Catholic church itself advised against the use of the Bible by the layman, and I must say it was a wise decision, considering the brainwashing that has been going on for many decades in the small christian communities led by ignorant and self-made pastors and preachers.
Now, we are turning to the Acts of the Apostles, that are, in fact, the relation of the Apostles' life after the departure of Jesus, and the rise of Paul (who was not an Apostle), the newly converted christian, as one of the most influential among the disciples. It shows their constant struggle to remain afloat amid the sketicism of their own people, with the Sanhedrin and the Sadducees constantly harrassing them and plotting to arrest their leaders. Many miracles occurred during that time and they made many converts, but as far as the Apostles and the disciples were concerned, it was in the name and through Jesus that they healed, which is not exactly what the Master had taught them during his ministry. They did not believe in their own God-power to heal, or rather to impress on the sick the idea of perfection. There is no difference between saying, Your sins are forgiventhan saying Take your bed and walk, for it is because of those sins (past or present errors) that the body is crippled, and removing the cause removes the condition. Of course, Jesus said that to prove a point, to show that the body can be healed through a change of thought forms. Therefore, he only healed those that were ready for such a transformational process.
The disciples relied even more on Jesus after his departure that was decided for the very reason that, according to his teachings, they were precisely to rely on their own God-given power and not lean on the Master to perform miracles. That has been the Achilles' heel of the disciples and the setback (probably foreseen by Jesus) that took 2000 years to overcome and brought us to the dawn of our renaissance and the accomplishment of our utimate destiny.
It is obvious the idea of a God of wrath and vengeance never really left the disciples, and this to such an extent that Peter himself was at the center of a very sad story where the punishment could not be compared with the crime even though it was (according to Peter himself) coming from God. It is the story of a man and a woman convert who decided, or were asked or convinced to sell their property and give the money to the community of disciples:
There was a man named Ananias who, with his wife Sapphira sold some property that belonged to them. But with his wife 's agreement, he kept part of the money for himself and handed the rest to the Apostles. Peter said to him, "Ananias, why did you let Satan take control of you and make you lie to the Holy Spirit by keeping part of the money you received for the property? Before you sold the property, it belonged to you; and after you sold it, the money was yours. Why then, did you decide to do such a thing? You have not lied to men- you have lied to God!" As soon as Ananias heard this, he fell down dead; and all who heard about it were terrified.... About three hours later, his wife, not knowing what had happened, came in. Peter asked her, "Tell me, was this the full amount you and your husband received for the property? Yes," she answered, "the full amount." So Peter said to her. Why did you and your husband decide to put the Lord's Spirit to the test? The men who buried your husband are now at the door, and they will carry you out too! At once she fell down at his feet and died. (Acts 5: 1-10)
This story should be right out of the Old Testament, not the Acts of the Apostles. It is hard to believe that Peter could go to such an extent for a mere question of money that belonged to those two people anyway. He had showed anger before, and whether he used his power or not to punish them is a matter between him and God. Nevertheless, he was a witness of their death and agreed with the sentence at least for the woman, for he warned her of her impending death and did nothing to prevent it. If the story is true, it can only mean that Peter himself did not really understand the meaning of Jesus' teachings and still clang to Old Testament teachings of a God of wrath and vengeance. The Master never performed miracles to harm anyone. His God had nothing to do with the God we find in the Old Testament, the Acts of the Apostles and The Letters, for none of those reflect the true essence of Jesus' teachings. That does not mean they weren't sincere. They were simple men that were called for the most important mission in the world, that of leading humanity back to where they came from. Whether they fulfilled that mission or not is unimportant for it is their sincerity of purpose that would eventually lead them to their own fulfillment and illumination.
It is also related that Peter did a few miracles and in Acts 3: 1-9, a lame is healed by the Apostle who did not believe the healing emanated from him:
You killed the one who leads to life, but God raised from death and we are witnesses to this. It was the power of his name that gave strength to this lame man. What you see and know was done by faith in his name; it was faith in Jesus that has made him well, as you can all see.
So, contrary to what Jesus had taught him, Peter had become a worshipper of the Master. Gradually Jesus the teacher was replaced by Jesus the Lord, the son of God, and he became the sacrificial Lamb by the hand of his own apostles:
Salvation is to be found through him alone; in all the world there is no one else whom God has given who can save us. (Acts 3: 12)
It is strange that the Acts of the Apostles which, according to its title, should talk about the Apostles and their life, merely covers part of the ministry of Peter and John with a mention of the other disciples here and there, and beginning with the arrest and eventual stoning of Stephen, it is Saul, who changed his name to Paul, who took the stand so to speak, and eventually became the unavowed leader of the church. From the writings, it seems obvious that, even though Barnabas came to his help and introduced him to the Apostles, Paul came uninvited in the circle of the disciples. He was feared and was always remembered as the one who persecuted the Christians. Thus bearing the stamp of Paul to such a great extent, the relations and teachings found in the Acts is not a true relation of the life and ministry of the Apostles. Following the Acts of the Apostles we find the Letters from Paul, James, Peter, John and Jude, 80% of which are the Letters from Paul, that stand out above all the rest as one of the most influential piece of writing of the Church, and to many christians, it even supersedes the Gospels and the teachings of Jesus. It is not surprising that, after many conflicts with the Apostles, Paul succeeded in imposing his own style, principles and understanding of Jesus' teachings (which he was barely acquainted with) to the newly born church. Thus, along with what he thought he understood of those teachings, Paul brought with him the judaic customs (he was a Pharisee) and the biases he had been accustomed to before his conversion. Even though he gradually severed the ties with judaism, many of his teachings still retained the intransigence he had shown in his pursuit of christians.
In the eyes of history, Paul was an enigmatic and complicated man who claimed to be both Jewish and Roman at the same time. He fought against what he believed to be a dangerous sect and then, following a vision he had of Jesus, believed he was called to fulfill a mission in the name of that sect. He did this to the best of his knowledge and abilities, but also with the same temper and impetuosity he manifested in the pursuit of Christians. In his own primitive time, he was probably the one who had the best chance of fulfilling that mission. He was a Jew, but a roman Jew. He was of the Pharisee cast and therefore educated enough in the scriptures and the customs of the jewish and roman people to further the goals of a new thought, a new look on spirituality that was to be spread throughout the world. His true purpose remains to be seen, for, at the reading of The Letters, we discover a new disciple quite intent on bringing that new thought to fruition, but leaning heavily on hebrew scriptures to make it more acceptable in the eyes of the jews. Thus, right from the beginning, the teachings of Jesus had lost their purity of thought and already bore the seal of jewish lore.
Of course, Jesus had not intended to found a new religion. He had sent his Apostles and disciples to spread the Word to all, regardless of religions and creeds. His true purpose was for them to try to improve whatever existed in the religious movements whether it was jewish, roman, or any other creed that might be found throughout the world and make them understand that true religion was, not in outward expressions of worship, but within the self. Their mission was to spread universal truths, not to add a new religion to the existing ones. Their strength would have resided in the fact they did not relate to any specific creed and therefore could not be accused of furthering the goals of a group in particular. It is the disciples' primitive and materialistic perception of who Jesus really was that brought about the founding of a temporal church and a return to the rites and worshipping that had been going on for eons of time in the jewish as well as in the roman temples.
Although it was not Jesus' idea, it was probably a good thing to write down some of his teachings for posterity, because, from what I find in the Letters from Paul, the latter was more inclined to quote the Old Testament than the words of the Master. Therefore, it is not surprising to find in the Letters, radical teachings on sin, sex and immorality, viewpoints that Jesus did not share, for they were part of the ancient teachings he was trying to transform. Those scriptures were so ingrained within their psyche that, as I said before, to many of the disciples, they superseded the teachings of the Master.
As Paul had not known him, what he heard of Jesus' teachings was from the disciples themselves, and it was quite normal that he questioned the accuracy of what was presented to him. In his mind, those teachings were not as important as the vision he had on the road to Damas. It had made such an impression on him, that he could not bring himself to believe Jesus was an ordinary man. Thus, he retained only the miraculous aspect of the experience. He never saw the real Jesus, he never saw the teacher who had spent three years in his own country, teaching spiritual truths no one ever heard before. He just saw Jesus, the only Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ and the Savior of the world. From those premises, one might conclude that, if he was a fervent disciple of Jesus whom he worshipped, he always remained somewhat disconnected from the teachings themselves. Therefore, Paul's teachings were mostly centered on worship, obedience, atonement and sin, the latter being quite prominent in the Letters. sin
In fact, after many shilly-shallying with the Apostles, Paul established himself as an authority in matters of doctrine and the group began to follow that new teacher who so cleverly amalgamated the Old Testament with the new thought of which Jesus had become the symbol. From that day, that doctrine became more and more an amalgamation of christian and jewish teachings, and the Church gradually grew on the pattern of the jewish and pagan rites that were prevalent in those days.
The Letters are about the only writings we have of Paul, and from what emerges from his teachings, I would say he tried, through what he retained of Jesus' teachings, to transform the Hebrew religious legacy into something more palatable and agreeable to the Jews and their God. That, of course, was the general idea of Jesus' teachings, but the Old Testament was so ingrained in the social and religious way of life of his people, that Paul found it more comfortable to teach the best (and the worst) of Hebrew lore while glorifying at the same time, the Jesus he met on the road to Damas. The little he taught on the Master's teachings was not very clear in his mind, and even though he called Jesus, the Christ, he did not really know the meaning of that word. Not being an Apostle, nor an early disciple of Jesus, Paul did not have the advantage of having been taught by the Master. He had not heard the convincing voice of Jesus when he talked about the Father. Besides, to the Apostles and disciples, he was like the fox in the sheepfold and they were probably reluctant to convey the teachings of their beloved Master to someone who used to persecuted them and could even be a spy of the Sanhedrin.
Saul went to Jerusalem and tried to join the disciples. But they would not believe that he was a disciple, and they were all afraid of him. (Acts 9: 26)
Therefore, Paul joined the Church in a context of fear and doubt on the part of the followers of Jesus, and he was not about to let them deter him from his divine mission. It is not surprising then, that he concentrated heavily on the Hebrew scriptures. Through that channel, he appears to have done his best to bring the Word of God as he thought he was told to do in his vision. This, of course, had nothing to do with Jesus' teachings, as he came, not to perpetuate the Law of Moses, but to improve on it and remove the incongruities that had inflitrated the scriptures in the course of centuries. So, it is only just to put Paul's teachings in their proper perspective and show that they bear, not the seal of Jesus, but that of the Old Testament.
Paul made his profession of faith when he was accused of starting riots among the Jews,
I do admit this to you: I worship the God of our ancestors by following that Way which they say is false. But I also believe in everything written in the Law of Moses and the books of the prophets. (Acts 24: 14)
This profession of faith shows that, even though he was a converted christian and taught the new Way, Paul was still a Pharisee at heart and was not about to leave everything behind as Jesus had taught his disciples. It states implicitely that he clang to and believed in Old Testament scriptures. Furthermore, Paul knew that whatever did not fit into the mold of Hebrew ways and customs had to be presented in a careful manner, as the priests were always on the look-out for any deviation from the scriptures.
For instance, circumcision was a very delicate subject and Paul knew he could easily slip on a banana skin when treating the subject, and with reason. He was teaching the Jews and Gentiles alike, but the latter were not circumcised and he had to explain how they could become children of God and not be circumcised. Not wanting to take sides in the matter, he replied,
Circumcision has value if you observe the law, but if you break the law, you have become as though you had not been circumcised. If those who are not circumcised keep the law's requirements, will they not be regarded as though they were circumcised? (Rom. 2: 25-26)
This reply, a very clever one indeed, demonstrates Paul's wavering, not in his faith and his belief in Jesus that always remained strong and unshakeable, but between his allegiance to the Jewish scriptures and the new Way he was called to preach. Even more, he seemed to be in contradiction with the Apostles themselves when it came to the doctrine. For instance he says,
The person who is put right with God through faith shall live. (Romans 1: 19)
This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. (Rom. 3: 22-24)
For if what God promises is to be given to those who obey the Law (the Law of God), then man's faith means nothing and God's promise is worthless. (Romans 4: 14)
This is a typical example of how Paul understood the teachings of Jesus of which he knew so little. Having become himself a christian through unwavering faith in Jesus, faith therefore became his strongest means of conversion. And yet, James does not seem to share this viewpoint,
What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? (James 2:14)
You see then that it is by his actions that a person is put right with God, and not by his faith alone. (James 2:24)
If I were to take sides on the matter, I would agree with James that man is judged by his thoughts and actions and will be rewarded accordingly. Faith has nothing to do with it. Faith is the sport of those who believe that the fact of going to church, attending mass or believing in God will open the gates of heaven. Faith is not a prerequisite to salvation. It is what we absorb in our spiritual self and the love we manifest as well as the way we treat others that will eventually bring us to our salvation and illumination.
Contrary to Jesus' teachings, Paul believed that God always favored the Jews before any other people. Because of his upbringing, he still believed they were the chosen people, and when he preached, he always managed to put it in perspective,
I have complete confidence in the gospel; it is God's power to save all who believe, first the Jews, and also the Gentiles. (Romans 1:16)
But God will give glory, honor and peace to all who do what is good, to the Jews first, and also to the Gentiles. For God judges everyone by the same standards. (Roman 2: 10-11)
That is a contradiction, for if God judges everyone by the same standards, there cannot be favoritism on his part and there can be no first and no second when it comes to divine justice. But now, God's way of putting people right with himself has been revealed. It has nothing to do with law, even though the Law of Moses and the prophets gave their witness to it. God puts people right through their faith in Jesus-Christ. (Romans 3: 21)
Each time Jesus used the word 'faith', it was to emphasize the fact that healing comes to those who are ready for such a transformation. It was not the faith in God or Jesus-Christ, but the faith of an individual in his own God-given power of healing. Jesus did not heal although he had the power to do so. He simply triggered the mechanism of healing in the individual, mechanism that each of us possesses by birthright. In fact, he never healed a person unless that person made a request (mental or spoken) to that effect. Once a woman touched him and she was healed because she believed she could be healed. Jesus even said that faith in oneself could move mountains. However, not once did he say that faith was a prerequisite to God's Love. God loves everyone equally and unconditionally, be it a Jew, a Mahometan, a Christian, a non-believer, a prostitute, a homosexual, a robber or a murderer of the worst kind.
Therefore, Paul erred immensely when he placed faith in God above the Law of God itself. God has no need of our faith, because he is there, within each of his creatures. The simple act of living is an act of faith in itself. God wants doers, not believers. God loves us all, because He is all of us.
It is obvious that Paul was obsessed with sex and he wrote and talked about it extensively. Jesus did not have that kind of discourse, and far from being obsessed with sex and sin, he came to the defense of Mary of Magdela the prostitute, and prevented her from being stoned by her own people. It is obvious that Paul never heard that story. He was the punishing kind as you can see below and even though he believed that the sins of mankind had been erased by Jesus' death, he nevertheless spent much of his time trying to eradicate it himself.
By his (Jesus) sacrificial death, we are now put right with God; how much more then will we be saved by him from God's anger! We were God's enemies, but He made us his friends through the death of His Son. (Romans 5: 9-10)
In fact, he spent his whole ministry talking about sin and warning the converts to repent. I am wondering how he could reconcile the fact that Jesus had erased the sins of mankind with his own crusade against sin. Had Jesus erased the sins of all humans that were living at that time, or were they erased for ever for all humanities, present and future? If they were, then the preaching against sin was useless. And if they were not, what was the purpose of dying to erase the sins of a people who would start sinning right after that.
God has no anger and no enemies, as Paul would have us believe. A personal God may have anger and enemies, because He is the creation of man, but the true God is an impersonal and yet benevolent God, for He is an intrinsic part of each and everyone of His creatures. Therefore Paul's words are only a restatement of Hebrew scriptures and, in this respect, he is more an emulator of John the Baptist than a true follower of Jesus' teachings.
As he considered himself a righter of wrongs, -he proved it when he pursued the christians- Paul was prompt to judge others on the basis of his belief in a punishing God, and he did not hesitate to pass judgment and order very severe punishment for those who had gone astray. The following excerpt gives an idea of Paul's pharisaic manner of thinking:
Now, it is actually being said that there is sexual immorality among you...I am told that a man is sleeping with his stepmother!...The man who has done such a thing should be expelled from your fellowship...I have already pass judgement on the man who has done this terrible thing. As you meet together and I meet with you in my spirit, by the power of our Lord Jesus present with us, you are to hand over this man to Satan for his body to be destroyed, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord. (Corinthians 5: 1-5)
Most christians are under the impression that Paul was an expert on Jesus' teachings and this to such an extent that they do not even take the time to read the Gospels, simply relying on the Acts of the Apostles and the Old Testament to perfect their own knowledge of the teachings. And yet, as I mentioned earlier, Paul was the least knowledgeable of the disciples when it came to Jesus' teachings.
I am not so sure what he meant by for his body to be destroyed, but it sure looks like a death sentence in the manner of Judaic religiosity. Is this really Paul, the disciple of Jesus? Jesus who forgave Mary of Magdela and told her accusers,
If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her. (John 8: 7)
No, it is Paul, a true follower of Jesus the miracle worker, the Lord Christ, the Son of God, but at the same time a firm believer in Old Testament's teachings of a God of wrath and vengeance. As I said before, it is not stated what Paul meant by these words to be destroyed, but, even if it were only for the thought, he was nevertheless showing he was an intolerant and, most probably, cruel man at times. His viewpoint on sexuality is, to say the least, primitive and childish, the cry for help of a man did not understand his own body and even less that of others.
Shall I take a part of Christ's body and make it part of the body of a prostitute? Impossible! (Corinthians 6: 15)
What is called Christ is God's power and attributes hidden (and ready to unfold) within each form He created. Therefore, the above statement is a nonsense and it shows that Paul was not well-versed in Jesus' teachings and certainly didn't understand the meaning of The Father and I are one.
A man does well not to marry. But because there is so much immorality, every man should have his own wife, and every woman should have her own husband...
A wife is not the master of her own body, but the husband is; in the same way the husband is not the master of his own body, but his wife is...
Now to the unmarried and to the widows I say that it would be better for you to continue to live alone as I do. But if you cannot restrain your desires, go ahead and marry. It is better to marry than burn with passion...
I tell you this, not as an order, but simply as a concession. Actually, I would prefer that all of you were as I am. (Corinthians 7: 1-8)
If you cannot refrain your desires, go ahead and marry
In just a few statements, Paul reveals his true feelings regarding women: he thought they were impure, and he also believed they were subordinate to men. If he did not actually hate them, he was, nevertheless, on the verge of misogyny and it is more than certain that this behavior greatly influenced the disciples and their pupils that were paving the way and building the new church. In his own view and if I understand him correctly, marriage is a panacea, a universal remedy for immorality.
These are the teachings that led to the ruling of the Church regarding the celibacy of priests. It had never been the intention of Jesus to require celibacy on the part of his disciples. In fact, he never mentioned it in his teachings and parables. Paul himself admits that his views on celibacy were his own thoughts and not a command from the Lord. From our modern perspective, they appear as the opinion of a man who did not understand his own sexuality and considered women as the source of all impurity. Of course, all these biases were amplified by the rigid teachings he had been exposed to since birth, biases that were well set in the jewish scriptures and kept alive by the orthodox religiosity of the times.
Advocating celibacy is the worst piece of advice Paul ever gave, and if it were only for that reason, the celibacy of priests is also the worst decision ever made. One cannot give an advice on what he doesn't know. Paul was a celibate and he was giving advice to married people and encouraging others not to marry unless absolutely necessary! Now, based on this, I can only imagine what some priests, all celibate, could have told their flock throughout the centuries.
Most christians are under the impression that Paul was an expert on Jesus' teachings, but I do believe he was not properly informed by the disciples. They did relate to him the story of Jesus' life, but they were reluctant to let him in on the teachings themselves. They may have mentioned some of them, but they did not totally trust a man who had persecuted them in the past. His vision of Jesus did not particularly impress them since they were not there to witness it, and they thought he might be a spy of the Jewish council. Therefore, anything they would tell him could be held against them in a court of law. Thus, true to his vision and his mission, Paul did the best he could to adapt the Hebrew teachings he was well-versed in to the new Way he was called to preach, and this led to the misinterpretations and biases that are disseminated here and there in his Letters.
Neither Paul nor the Apostles and disciples are to blame for what occurred in that period of time after the departure of Jesus. It was a trying period for all of them and they were all caught between their allegiance to their people and the religion they were taught since birth, and the New Way taught by a man who had left them all alone. Therefore, it is understandable that the Apostles, Paul and the disciples tried, for whatever reason, to amalgamate what they thought was the best of many schools of thought, jewish, pagan and the New Way taught by Jesus, and this led, once again, to a Church founded on materialism, worship, sin and intolerance.
Even though many of those disciples attain martyrdom, it is not a sure sign they had become enlightened beings. In itself, martyrdom is not an enlightening goal. It is a choice of life that may have to do with karmic considerations related to past lives. Personally, I would rather risk my life to save someone else than die for my faith, because there is absolutely nothing to gain in the process. It has been said that Jesus gave his life to save humanity, but the wars, inquisitions and crusades of the past two thousand years tell us that such is not the case. Jesus accepted to let his body take the appearance of death, to show mankind the immortality of the etheric body he had perfected, not to become a martyr and savior of the world.
The 3rd factor, The businesslike hierarchical structure of the Church and its materialistic approach to spirituality, stems, at least in part, from the teachings of Paul, because those teachings gave the impression that the disciples had complete authority and power over the spiritual and physical welfare of their flock (Acts 5: 1-10) and all decisions were in their hands. Thus, the hierarchical structure took form, as one became head of a church, another, the right-hand man, and so on until it grew into something Jesus had not foreseen when he sent them to preach, a structure more intent on organizing, building churches, leading processions, collecting tithes or discussing, in a council, various points of the doctrine and whether it pleased God or not, than really care for those that needed spiritual help. That kind of materialism has led to a superficial religion where appearance was more important than the doctrine itself. Thus the munificence of its churches and the pomp and ceremonial of its rites.
Up to the 6th century and in spite of jewish and roman influence, many teachings of the masters, such as the fact he was a human as all of us, the idea that religion was within the self and the reincarnational process, these were taught by the disciples, but all this changed with the Council that was held in Constantinople in 543, when a majority of bishops, controlled by emperor Justinian, who was holding the Pope captive, removed from the doctrine all teachings - amongst others, those that had to do with the principle of reincarnation taught by Origen himself - that did not correspond to Justinian's christianity. In the same council, the Church proclaimed Jesus as the Only Son of God and the Savior of humanity, thus confirming what many disciples had believed all along anyway, that Jesus was on a higher level , a state that none of them could reach. This is how the Master officially became the intermediary between God and man, the scapegoat that erased the sins of mankind and the Savior of a humanity that could not stand on its own two feet and had to be carried to the throne of God. Once again, religion had returned to worshipping and the words of Jesus had no more relevance since they were originally given to awaken all men and women to their true nature of sons and daughters of God.
The error was not in the deification of Jesus, but rather in the affirmation that he was the only son of God, thus placing humanity in a subordinate role where all must turn to him for their salvation. This has been going on for centuries, and the churches, guided by pastors and priests, many of them good and devoted people, but unaware of the spiritual principles that govern the cosmos, have kept alive the illusion that we were the servants of God when, in reality, it is God that serves us in all our needs each minute and each day of our life.
And this is how religions gradually became a mirror of paganism with its icons and rites, and once again, the Old Testament became the bedside book and the modus vivendi of millions of christians, even superseding the New Testament and the teachings of Jesus.
The age that just ended was riddled with difficulties that led the Church to become a rigid structure centered on the doctrine and its dogmas rather than paying attention to the spiritual needs of its flock. It is only in this manner that, in spite of its bloody crusades and its Inquisition, the Church was able to survive the centuries, using the bugbear of confession and the fear of hell to hold in its power the faithfulo that have joined its ranks in the course of centuries.
The 20th century has seen the rise of a new humanity that could not be satisfied with a religion where red and scarlet were the colors of power and domination, and the priests, the servants of their religious leaders instread of being the servants of their flock. The confessionals would have a lot to tell and numerous were the families literally destroyed by the intransigence of those priests who placed the doctrine above the well-being and the life of those that were in their care.
After the horrors of World War II where 6 millions Jews lost their life in the gas chambers and the Church did very little to prevent it, (after all, they had killed Jesus!), many people began to question themselves on the legitimacy of an institution that controlled the spiritual life of its flock and went as far as interfering in their sexual life. They question the infallibility of a religious leader who persisted in perpetuating antiquated and sometimes erroneous church laws when society itself was evolving slowly but surely towards the third millenium. More and more people ceased to practice a religion to which, with the exception of baptism, marriages and funerals, they barely participated. In spite of severe warnings of the Church, contraceptives made their appearance in drugstores all over the western world, more and more women resorted to abortion to end an undesired pregnancy and homosexuals began to manifest openly a natural desire to live their life according to their own inner feelings with regard to relatinships and sexuality.
The priests themselves had to walk their own personal calvary and suffer the harshness of a Church they believed to be loving and compassionate. From the 40s to the middle 70s, a great number of priests decided to leave the priesthood, because the clerical state, or the Church itself, fell short of their own spiritual longings. Then began a long struggle between the Church and its dissident priests, during which time the latter were submitted to pressures and injustices worthy of the Inquisitions of the past. After years of service and dedication in the service of the faithful, many of them found themselves with just a few dollars to last a few months because the mother church was angry and wanted to teach a lesson to all those delinquent priests.
Such was also the case in the religious communities, male and female, where the members, faithful to their vows of poverty, worked all their life for room and board so to speak, while their congregation rented their services to schools and institutions for a substantial amount that went into the coffers of the community. Then, when these priests and sisters were really in need of help, they were left with just a few pennies and abandoned to their fate those who dared break the contract that married them to the Church for life. All this because they believed their communities were above meanness and greed when the time came to help someone in need. The only explanation possible would be that the Church never really understood the teachings of Jesus with regard to love, brotherhood and compassion.
This was the road human beings chose to thread during the Age of the Fish, a transitory route strewed with difficulties and temptations that has finally led tgo the spiritual humanity growing all around us. This new humanity cannot content themselves with a statu quo that has been going on for centuries, perpetuated by religious leaders of another age, torn between their allegiance to the doctrine and the imperatgives of a humanity in constant evolution. Many times in the course of its history, the Church could have come out of its ivory tower and sound out its members with regards to their own spiritual orientation. It has unfortunately chosen to perpetuate dogmas and myths instead of growing in wisdom and knowledge. The Church has voluntarily remained static for so long that it would need a drastic democratic uprising of its younger members to revive it.
If I were to sum up all this, I would say that what occurred two thousand years ago was part of a cosmic scenario that, in spite of the negativity engendered in the process, unfolded as expected by the spiritual forces that watch over us. Of course, the teachings of Jesus, that is, the most important ones, did not find their way into the churches of christianity, but enough of it filtered through to arouse the curiosity of future generations of seekers that wanted to know about the so-called mysteries of life the Church has always considered as divine prerogatives, sacred and out of reach. And of course there were spiritual teachers that appeared here and there among the many civilizations that followed. They were not prominent preachers or heads of churches. They were simple men working in the background, seeking those that were eager to listen to and accept in their hearts the fundamental truths of life.
The most fundamental truth is this: whether we recognize this fact or not, we are the Gods of creation. There is no other God but the God we are individually. There is no personal God that watches us from on high. There is however an exact replica of the Supreme Energy we call God, hidden within each of the forms of life He created. We were created in the image and likeness of God. So, there is no need for God to watch over Himself! This is why it is said that God is All and All is God. God is everywhere. It is only when humanity finally knows and understand that God is literally and individually, each of His creatures; that he could not express Himself in the etheric and physical worlds if it weren't for the billions of billions of spirits that inhabit the bodies of creation in the billions of planets of the cosmos, that we will understand the words of Jesus when he gave the most important of his teachings:
The Father and I are One. I am in the Father as the Father is in me.
The greatest challenge is yet to come and the rebirth process has already begun in the whole universe. A new vibration has invaded the cosmos with the result that humanity will have a chance to raise their vibrations a step further and become a part of the new spritual world that is now dawning upon us.
The Age of Aquarius, that began around 1934, is now leading us to heights never before attained. May this period of transformation and changes open our heart and our mind to a greater perception of the cosmos and the understanding that we are all brothers and sisters and sons and daughters of the same Father, the God that resides in each and everyone of us.
Ledash