RR-ESM. An introduction

1. A Course in Miracles Overview
2. Your Will and God’s Will are the same
3. The difference between Course and Christianity
4. Original Sin, Christianity’s most destructive teaching
5. Why Christ was really crucified
6. My analysis of the ego
7. An overview of the world we live in
8. The American economy
9. About marriage and relationships
10. The pickle jar
11. Drugs and alcohol and why people use them
12. Vegetarianism, the wave of the future
13. David Hawkins. Truth vs. Falsehood
14. Exorcism, a relic from the dark ages
15. Race and racism
16. The culture of death.
    • War
    • Abortion
    • Capital Punishment
17. Life before and after death
18. Our living companions on this planet and the difference between them and us
19. The possibility of life in outer space and what if anything it means to us
20. Three explanations for the way things are
21. The value of the workbook and memorizing text
22. E-mail and FAQs
23. Donations
24. In Conclusion
25. Videos
    
26. Spiritual Revelation
    

RR-ESM

26. Spiritual Revelation

This essay is about spiritual revelation. I will utilize several examples regarding this subject and analyze them. By spiritual revelation I mean any and all communication from God or any other spiritual power. With that definition in mind, let's analyze the following examples.

The first example wewill utilize is the Mormon Church since they are a large organization founded upon spiritual revelation. It was founded upon the spiritual revelation Joseph Smith received from God. As I understand it from my somewhat limited study of his revelation and the Mormon Church he recieved a set of gold plates from the angel Moroni and in addition talked to the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost in a garden. From this series of spiritual revelations, the Book of Mormon was created, and the Mormon Church founded.

The next example we will utilize is the Course in Miracles. This is a modern text published in 1975 by a Jewish research psychologist named Helen Schucman. She heard an inner voice for seven years, wrote down everything it told her, and this became the Course in Miracles.

The next example is a text called The Disappearance of the Universe, by Gary Renard. He spoke with two ascended spiritual masters named Arten and Pursah once a year for ten years and wrote the 409-page text.

There are of course many more examples of this subject but in the interest of making this somewhat short and readable, I will only utilize one more book here. Pat Rodegast and Judith Stanton wrote Emmanuel's Book. It is about Pat Rodegast's communication with a being of golden light named Emmanuel.

Of course we can't forget the Holy Bible, and I didn't. It's just that it's not the work of one individual, but rather a collection of written works that span several centuries and is often translated from different languages. In that regard, it's different to the more modern works I described above.

Now that we have some examples, let's dive right in. The first thing is three of the books I mentioned above are considered New Age, and as such are considered the work of the devil by many religious people. There is also much division and argument over which one is the truth. At the more extreme ends of the religious spectrum we have Islam, which of course teaches that everyone else is the infidel and deserves death. They are extremely dangerous, in that they often act upon this belief. The teachings of the Mormon Church are also extreme, in that they teach that everyone else is a Gentile, and all other churches are of the devil. However, in fairness to the Mormon Church, they are not dangerous in that they don't advocate death for non-believers. They only teach that we are all going to hell. In the interest of being brief, I will examine Islam, Christianity and Mormonism as one. If you read the Koran, the Book of Mormon, and the Holy Bible you will note they are all full of violence and war and killing. They also advocate child abuse and hatred of others for their race and sexual orientation.

A Course in Miracles is conspicuous by the absence of these things. There is no killing, endorsement of war, or approval of hatred for your fellow man for the color of his skin of sexual orientation anywhere in Course. The other New Age texts are much the same.

Now we will get to the crux of the matter, the filet mignon of this essay. How are we to know which one of these is the truth? If we guess wrong, we are going to hell. This is terrible. We have to be right. We must spend a lifetime in prayer and anguish and hope we are right because the welfare of our eternal souls depends on our decision.

Well, I have great news for any and all concerned. They are all correct. Every one of these are indeed revelations from God and it doesn't matter which one you follow, as long as you do not violate man's law and harm your fellow human beings. I should also note here that no one is going to hell because there is no such place.

How can they all be correct is the first and most obvious question, so let's get right to into it. They are all correct because God does not exist as an eternal power. God is not like a King or a President who tells us what to do. God exiists together with each one of us and anyone is capable of hearing and acting upon the voice of God at any time.

The next question, then, is how can different people receive different revelations. This is a product of the personality of the people and the times they live in. For instance, let's take Joseph Smith as an example. Joseph Smith wanted to enjoy the company of many women and wanted to be a womanizer, but the people of his time didn't approve of it. The people of his time also owned Black people as slaves and thought of Black people as inferior to White people. These beliefs and general attitude of the people of his time, and Joseph Smith's wants and desies would account for his revelation that plural marriage was good, and Black people were cursed.

Let's utilize Helen Schucman as an example. She was a modern educated person, so onewould expect her writings and revelations from God to reflect that. A modern, educated person does not believe war is good or necessary, that children should be beaten, or that it's right to hate someone for the color of their skin, their religious beliefs, or their sexual orientation.

The next subject I want to deal with is not a pleasant one. Never the less, I did read this book, and as a student of the human condition, I learned much from it. The book is Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer. It's the story of Ron and Dan Lafferty, who recieved a revelation from God thatthey were to kill four people, and killed two of them, their brother's wife and her fifteen month old daughter. They are currently doing life in the Utah penal system, except that one of them is under a death sentence. However, who knows when and if that will get done.

During their multiple trials, there was endless debate about their sanity. Of course the general consensuswas they must be insane because they couldn't have possibly received a revelation from God to kill these people. But that's not the case. Let's take several examples here. When I think of God, I think of three different entities. First there is the God of the Old Testament, the God of wrath and vengeance. He drowned the whole human race, except for Noah and his family. Then thereis the God of the New Testament, the Christian God of Mercy who nailed his son to the cross. Then, of course, we have the God of the Mormon Church, Heavenly Father. He killed a lot of people, too. So in that light, why couldn't the Lafertys have received a revelation from God to killfour people?

The point of this all is that it doesn't matter if they received a revelation or not. That's why we have man's law, and man's law says it's not OK to kill people just because you reveive a revelation from God.

The next question is what shouldwe do with these people. We can't turn them loose because they might receive another revelation from God to kill anyone at any time, and in that respect, they are a danger to society. The only sensible answer is that they should be permanently removed from society either by execution or life imprisonment.

In closing, I want to analyze revelations from God and what they are. When I think of God and Revelations and communication with God, I believe that could also be thought of as the work of our subconcious mind, or, as others have described it, that 98% of our mind that goes unused. I believe people fail to understand how powerful the human mind really is. I think the subconcious mind of Joseph Smith could have actually created golden plates he could touch and translate from a different language. Joseph Smith could have actually influenced the other people to see them. Gary Renard's subconcious mind could have actually created Arten and Pursah for him to communicate with. In that respect, I believe these are not someone's imagination or delusion, butare titally real and I actually believe they did happen.

This leaves us with the question of what relevance all thishasto the individual. My personal belief is that one's religious beliefs, or lack of them, if that is the case, should servethe individual, not a nonexistent external power. For example, although I do go to my local Mormon Church most Sunday mornings and I socialize with my Mormon friends, there is no way I could ever become a member of the Mormon Church because their beliefs do not serve me. For instance, I could never believe that everyone else is the church of the devil, or give 10% of my income to a cause I do not believe in. Course in Miracles beliefs do serve me in that there is no organization I'm required to give 10% of my income to, and they do not advocate killing or violence, nor do they believe in original sin and all that good stuff.

In closing, I hope you found this of interest.

RR-ESM

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