Prophet versus Church-maker, versus Church administrator - Spirituality versus Psychology. Examples of Joseph Smith and Rudolf Steiner

I am very struck by the historically-recorded lives of people who were (to some genuine extent) Prophets, and who also went-on to found a church, or analogous spiritual organization. 

Two that I feel I know pretty well are Joseph Smith (1805-1844), the Mormon who founded the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints; and the spiritual philosopher Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) who founded the Anthroposophical Society. 

Although there are important differences between Smith and Steiner; in spiritual (and psychological) terms, both men made a transition from primarily functioning as inspired Prophets, to primarily functioning as institutional leaders. 

They both went from being Prophets expounding and teaching spiritual knowledge; to "CEOs" organizing and administering large new institutions - the CJCLDS church and the AS.  

Both organizations continued, and still exist; and in both cases their leadership became primarily bureaucratic in form and function; and primarily administrative in focus and methods - even within the lives of their founding Prophets...

("Primarily" - in both cases Smith and Steiner continued genuine and valuable Prophetic activity up to their deaths. But this was increasingly swamped and subordinated by an imperative  focus on sustaining and building-up the organizations they had founded.)

And (consequently, I would say) the CJCLDS and AS leadership soon became and have since remained; hardly (if at all) prophetic - and not-at-all creative. 

The organizational response, of both CJCLDS and AS, to the transformation from a Prophetically-inspired to administrative-in-nature; was to assert that organizational structures and standardized forms Just Do function spiritually. 

The assertion is that the bureaucracy, and the standardized teachings, and the officially approved rituals, activities, and texts - will (if properly done) link the properly-trained and duly-initiated institutional member, to that same spiritual reality as was Prophetically-contacted by the founder. 

I have italicized that verb "assert" above - because that is what such institutions; and indeed the older Christian churches, actually do. 

But whether or not this assertion of spiritual access via institutional membership, structures, and forms is actually true - is a very different matter. 

Indeed, to me, it does not seem to be true.

I do not see that the CJCLDS or AS or indeed any of the other or older Christian churches - are providing spiritual access via their institutional nature.  

What is partially true, what they do provide - to varying degrees and in various ways -  are desired psychological benefits. 

There is usually, therefore, some kind of psychological effect from CJCLDS and AS (and other) institutional memberships - and some of these psychological effects are desired and experienced as positive. 

People may feel (and this seems to be strongest) a sense of communal belonging. 

They may feel (at least briefly) calmed, reassured, encouraged.

Membership and participation may make people happier than otherwise. 

BUT - what I am suggesting here, is that such positive psychological effects of institutional membership are not (it seems to this observer) leading their members onto experience of contact with any solid and motivating spiritual reality. 

Neither the CJCLDS nor the AS are primarily spiritual in their nature, and they have not been primarily spiritual for a very long time; and they may well be (in most instances) completely non-spiritual in their experiential actuality...

If indeed they ever were spiritual organizations. 

At any rate, and in both instances; it is striking how very few prophetically-spiritual (and therefore creative-natured) people existed in the organizations after the founders died.

In the case of the Anthroposophical Society; perhaps the only strikingly original and Prophetic member post-Steiner - Valentin Tomberg - was swiftly expelled, and eventually became an un-orthodox Roman Catholic!   

The reason for all this is that - as of here and now and for (probably) some centuries at least - Institutions Cannot Be Primarily Spiritual.    

The necessities of surviving as institutions exclude the possibility of a primary spiritual focus. They can assert spirituality, but they only ever actually achieve psychological benefit. 

And indeed, in response to their primary and ruling imperatives as institutions; any occurrence of genuinely Prophetic spirituality among the membership is more likely to be excluded, like Tomberg and the AS...

Or if not personally expelled, then substantively excluded; as with Owen Barfield -- Who served as a senior officer in the British AS bureaucracy, but whose major and original philosophical spiritual contributions were not allowed to affect the teaching of a closed-canon of Steiner texts, and their institutionally-expedient interpretations. 

(As far as I can tell; the AS core teaching has always been only-texts-by-Steiner, and non-creative commentaries-on-Steiner. Analogous to the teaching of a Protestant church in relation to the Bible.) 

Institutions cannot be spiritual in their nature in this modern era. 

Of course a church may sometimes and for some people mediate genuine spiritual experiences; so churches do continue to be spiritually valuable - in some situation and with particular individuals. 

But we are all confronted by the choice between primary affiliation to an essentially not-spiritual and core-bureaucratic institution; or else pursuing experience of spiritual reality primarily from our own resources and motivations, and in accordance with out own discernments.

Therefore, a Christian who acknowledges the importance of The Spiritual; but who is not willing to subordinate his spiritual life to an institution that is firstly organizationally-driven and secondarily only psychological in its benefits...

Such a Christian would need to regard any church, and organization; as at best a possible spiritual resource, and never as a spiritual master. 

 

To "follow" Jesus - an exercise

I have often argued, in recent years, that the key instruction in the IV Gospel is to "follow" Jesus, and that the best encapsulation is (probably) the Good Shepherd section of this Gospel. 

But I suggest an exercise - which takes about ten minutes: Here is the IV Gospel - do a word search on "follow, and read quickly but attentively through all the usages of this word in relation to Jesus instructing his disciples what to do. 

I think, through this, we can then begin to glimpse the simplicity of what Jesus is asking. 

To me, he seems to be saying that because he is - like us - a Man, and also a Son of God; we can do after our death what Jesus will do after his death. 

Meaning: attain eternal resurrected life, after death. 

And that Jesus shall personally make this possible, for each person as an individual.  

In other words; "follow" has a sort-of double meaning, a more-passive and more-active meaning. 

Passively, we follow-behind, in the route Jesus has made between this mortal life, via death to resurrected everlasting life in heaven. 

More actively; Jesus will help us do this, he will "come back, and help us in this "journey". And it is us who chooses to make this journey, who takes the "steps" on it - because even a sheep must choose to follow specifically he whom the sheep regards as his Good Shepherd. 

The lost sheep does not follow just-anybody; but to be saved the lost sheep must follow the Good Shepherd. 

Nor is the act of following, something automatic and inevitable - the lost sheep must recognize the Good Shepherd, and choose to follow, and actually take the steps of following.   

That's what seems to be said to me - and also what is actually true; but you may, of course, read it differently!

Why politics has become negative - loss of the unconscious, spontaneous, naturalness of communal values

If the verities of our spiritual life are things like our-selves and God and divine creation; then by contrast politics is ultimately arbitrary. In the world as it is now, and ourselves as we are now; wherever and however we draw boundaries around our categories, there is a strong element of arbitrary imposition. 

Nothing is now obvious and spontaneous; everything is contested and a matter of choice. Hence ideology has displaced nature. 

What was once unconscious and happened naturally - isn't any more. 

In the past we found-ourselves and grew up immersed in a communal situation - which became primary. 

Our values were inculcated by mechanisms that were unconscious, spontaneous, natural - this was almost unavoidable. 

Not Any More.

At least from adolescence, if not before - we experience our-selves as individuals in a world of many options. Nothing is "given" because everything can be (and sooner or later is) brought to awareness, consciousness - so that we find ourselves standing outside of questions; questions that once were simply the-way-it-is.  

The problem with all politics as-is; is that it is based upon arbitrary - ideological - categories. 

However we cut-up reality in order to discuss it and make plans - we are confronted with the need for conscious choices about what is valid, what is good, what ought to be the aim. 

Hence ideology; which imposes these top-down, consciously; and then claims that doing-this has been necessary and real. 

Consider the apparently sensible maxim that it is better for us to "mind our own business" and not to meddle in the business of others.

Once we move from the business of our own spiritual life in the context of the everything, we are confronted by intermediate levels of analysis - and questions. 

Is our family our business? Is our street, village city, nation, region, civilization our business? There are arguments for each of these levels as genuinely impacting on our own business - so why stop at our civilization - why not include the world, the planet, the universe? 

Soon it seems that either everything is our business - or else nothing but our selves... and maybe our self isn't primarily our business; since plenty of people assert that our business is to "serve" other-people (or God). 

We might therefore conclude that we our-selves have no business at all; or else that our business is everything - or we may conclude that our business is our race, nation, or ideology!   

My point is that this matter of categories, drawing lines, making qualitative distinctions Just Is a matter requiring discernment, choices, commitments - such that in 2025 and the West the categories can no longer serve as the basis or justification for values...

So, it used to be possible to have one's clan or tribe or (small) nation as the basis for values - but it isn't any more; since before we can be "a nationalist" (or whatever) we have had to decide to make this our business. 

And this also applies to our religion.  

Yet in the past it certainly seems like these categories (clan, place, religion) really did have a primary reality - they were that from-which we argued, from-which our values emerged. 

Indeed; if we assume that our primary loyalties used-to-be unconscious, spontaneous, natural and communal - nowadays, for many people, this is lost - and the opposite is true!

Politics (in its many manifestations) is a reality, but a negative reality. 

In the past xenophobia was unconscious, spontaneous, natural - and (apparently) a necessary part of our natural and unavoidable positive affiliations to peoples, places, religions...

But nowadays xenophilia - love of the "other" is more common, more valued, and apparently more influential. 

And indeed difficult to avoid! Nearly everybody, me included, has a tendency to "idealize" some or another "foreign and hearsay kind of place, religion, grouping... (And often something about which we have only superficial or hearsay knowledge.) 

So; instead of the unconscious and spontaneous values of human history; we find-ourselves in a situation of multiple-choices and chosen-ideologies. 

We therefore ought to embrace and make-the-best-of the inevitable!

We should choose, take responsibility for our choices, and remain aware that we have chosen. 

Good politics is impossible in such situations - since all possible politics entails dishonesty about the nature and implications of its conclusions and assertions; it entails hiding and denying its own roots.  

It is therefore up to each of us, as individuals, to make these choices in the best possible way that we can envisage and attain; or else - since good politics is become impossible - we shall be the ones who suffer the consequences. 

Christian theories should be understood as like scientific theories - Even when judged True, they may be improved, or replaced

A big, maybe lethal, problem with almost all of Christian theology, is the absolute conviction that there can be nothing new under the sun.

So that (for instance) because we have inherited an either/or dichotomy - such that knowledge or values are either subjective or objective - that must be all there is, and nothing more valid can ever be discovered or devised. 

Or, there is the idea that - to be A Christian involves accepting some body of already-existing knowledge as Just True - all true, now and forever. 

This blocked me from becoming a Christian for many, many years - because I had never come across any field of knowledge that was ever Just True, now and forever - or where I was expected to accept this up-front - expected to submit my judgment (now and come what may) to a large, complex, total and unalterable package. 

This is what is required of a Christian convert in most churches; there is some body of statements that you expected to promise, to swear is true, to pledge obedience, to commit to behave thus...

This is difficult for a truthful person to do, and it does notfeel right to be asked to do it. It is an act of submission - and what the convert is asked to submit to claims to be divine truth - and yet it comes to us as human, all too human - and indeed it soon turns out that nobody on the inside really believes or does all of it; especially not church leaders.

  

Of course one can do this nonetheless, and suppress the worry that one will not be able to live up to the promises. But what is hard to suppress is the conviction that this is a bad thing to do: I mean, it is a bad thing to expect people to swear and promise to stuff that nobody really believes or acts upon - and which often does not make coherent sense. 

It is maybe because I was a scientist - and a theoretical scientist - for much of my life, that I have always believed that there are indeed new concepts that may be discovered or devised, and that these revisions may be better than what existed in the past. 

Something that is "true" - a theory, a monograph, a scientific paper, a field of research - is true in such a way that it is nonetheless capable of revision, or even radical reshaping - as when Newtonian Physics was true; yet gave way to Einsteinian or Quantum Physics - which was also true, and better. 

This seems quite normal to me - and the weight of tradition (the great names of the past) in science does not have the same inhibiting - indeed paralysing - effect that it does in theology. 

Creative science is about accepting the overall validity of tradition (its honesty, and usefulness), but that any actual science always has errors, incompleteness, and incoherences; and therefore can be - often needs to be - improved, and potentially transformed - at least in principle (although this is usually difficult). 

And our guide is primarily honesty - with ourselves and with others; and honesty in the context of transcendental values; which for a Christian means (I would say) motivated-intent to live in loving harmony with divine creation, and the aspiration to salvation . 

I think this is a true and healthy attitude to any functional body of claimed knowledge, any system - including theology and any particular church doctrine. 

In real science, we engage with tradition and great scientists, strive to understand them - but any serious scientist regards himself as at least able to add something, to change things for the better. 

And, if he is any good, and has found "his problem"; he ought to strive to make new discoveries (or reveal past neglected discoveries) - when these are needed. 

For instance; nobody in 20th century biology is, or would regard would regard himself, as an equal to Darwin - or as his superior as a scientist. 

But Darwin's mechanism for his theory of evolution by natural selection did not make coherent sense; because Darwin did not know about genetics.

 

To combine natural selection with genetics (the "Modern Synthesis") was a colossal intellectual achievement that took several decades, and involved work by several people; such as Julian Huxley (brother of Aldous), Theodosius Dobzhansky, and Ernest Meyer - none of whom have a reputation as great as Darwin, and who (despite being genuinely creative and major scientists) are essentially unknown outside a group of specialists. 

If the scientists of the Modern Synthesis had shared the attitude of church-serving Christians; they would have said "Darwin may be incoherent, but Who Am I to try and improve on what such a toweringly great scientist did? How can little old me possibly succeed, where Darwin failed?" 

They would have given up without trying! And thereby the synthesis of Natural Selection and genetics - a theory that nowadays is understandable by innumerable normal school children (and even by most biological science majors at university) - would never have happened. 

Instead, if science had been like theology; Darwin's much more partial and incoherent theories would still be taught as the best that can be known by humans. 

In sum: the first and most famous of past scientific theories can be, and often have been, improved by other and later humans - even by those far less great that the originators (or not great at all); because it is so much more difficult to create a theory as Darwin (and Wallace) did, compared with being able to comprehend and improve a theory as Huxley et al did; compared with merely being able to understand and repeat a theory - like any 18 year old who has studied the theory of natural selection. 

Christian theology is stuck at the level of understanding and repetition. 

Well, by my reckoning; Theology consists of human theories. Theories about things like the nature of reality, the nature of God and what Jesus did; and human theories are prone to human incompleteness and error. 

(Analogously, church doctrines, principles, and rules are in-effect human theories about matters such as how best to become and stay a Christian, and how best to attain salvation.) 

In principle - so long as someone is honestly motivated to live in loving harmony with divine creation, and committed to salvation; then I see no reason why he needs to be a theological genius of the stature of Abelard, Scotus, Luther, or whatever is your idea of a definitive theologian. 

But with theology, as does not happen in science; this matter gets mixed-up with assertions of spiritual authority of churches and church-endorsed theologians. 

We are stuck at the level of repetition; because anything else is regarded as blasphemous pride - as if anyone who understands and tries to improve on the human theological theories of the likes of Paul, Boethius, Augustine, Aquinas - must be setting himself up as greater than them!

The point is that the issue at stake is - for each of us - my life in this world and my salvation. 

What matters crucially is whether I am satisfied with the truth and coherence of given theology, the implicit theories of church doctrine, or whatever is important to my situation in this world. 

In seeking to do better than what is inherited - or, more exactly, what current authorities interpret and assert has been inherited; I don't need to convince anybody else - than I need to satisfy myself. 

I should keep striving for something better until I am honestly satisfied.

And if I later stop being satisfied with what used to satisfy me, and this is making an adverse difference; well, then I should be prepared to start striving all over again. 

NOTE: This post is adapted from some comments I made at Francis Berger's blog.

Romantic Christianity is not Only negative and reactive...

The cultural era (commencing in Western Europe in the late 1700s) known as Romanticism, is usually described in terms of being a negative reaction; partly against the newly dominant "rationalism" and scientism - reducing divine creation to a contrivance of clockwork wheels; and then fuelled by the beginnings of urbanization, noise, regimentation and pollution from the Industrial Revolution. 

And much the same applies to those of us "dissident" Christians whom I have termed Romantic Christians - they/we are usually understood as reacting-against. 

As I say - this is correct, so far as it goes - but it is not the whole story. 

But Owen Barfield (following Rudolf Steiner) clarified that Romanticism also had a positive agenda; it tended to regard "nature" as much more significant, alive and purposive than did Medieval or Reformation Christianity. This included an interest and seriousness about "the supernatural", and the "magical".   

There was a strong focus on the value of more intense personal states of awareness, intuition, revelation and the like - a "poetic" perspective on life. 

There was a new high-valuation of individual creativity including genius. 

In terms of Christianity; these might briefly be translated as striving for a faith rooted in direct personal experience and responsibility. 

Altogether; Romanticism - and this includes Romantic Christianity - has now been around long enough that surely it ought to be accorded more than the usual dismissive condescension - or quasi-puritantical abhorrence - that is its fate among orthodox and traditionalist Christians?

As I understand it; Romanticism among Christians is partly a negative and reactive rejection of the corruption, dullness, triviality, and superficiality of the churches; but when it is serious is has a more motivating and positive agenda: which relates to an inner conviction that a better Christianity is possible than that resulting from the primacy of church obedience - a Christianity that is more honest, more coherent, more inspiring, and more responsible. 

This refusal to subordinate ones primary religious convictions to the external authority of a church does not - Of Course Not - mean that a Romantic Christian is obliged to live a solitary and isolated life of abstention from all ritual, music, scripture, tradition...

It merely means that these come second, and not first; and the Romantic Christian's engagement with the forms and symbols of Christianity are subordinated to his direct and personal relationship with the divine - which is given primacy, as his motivating ideal. 

Parasitic destruction - Increasing local order, by increasing total entropy? The Neo-Darwinian assumption of Western geopolitics

Deep theorists of biological evolution since Schrodinger, have (by ignoring his speculations on negentropy) mostly assumed that it is a parasitic process; which exploits already-existing order. 

This is inevitable in an atheistic context, where divine creation is rejected. 

In effect; because entropic change (and death) is unavoidable; modern secular societies must theoretically derive order from chaos - because nothing else is conceivable, must derive adaptive evolution from a tendency towards random disorder combined with zero-sum competition, positive from negative, good from evil.

In a nutshell; local creation is seen as only possible by net-destruction.   

What happens (in ultimate terms) from this mainstream secular "Neo-Darwinian" point-of-view is that an organism maintains or increases its own functional order by increasing total entropy.

(When the existence of a positively creative force/ tendency/ purpose has been ruled-out by assumption, and only negative/ destructive/ entropic tendencies are allowed for consideration - then some version of this "getting positive outcomes from from negative inputs" must be the case. Neo-Darwinian evolution is the best known version of such reasoning; Adam Smith-type "free market economics" is another.)   

For instance; the functionality of an animal depends upon them consuming (using-up) the energy and organization of plants; and plants use-up inputs of solar energy to construct high energy molecules that are used by animals to remain functional. 

All the time; no matter the level or organization achieved by organisms and their social structures; overall entropy is increasing, net energy is being used-up by the existence of organisms - and societies.

This model has, over the past century and a half, become the basis for the fundamental value-system of first Western, then global, society. 

To put it differently; all that is "good" (i.e. functional) in a society - effectiveness, prosperity, capability, law and order, consumer goods, entertainment... All this necessarily and ultimately derives from a parasitic exploitation - by a process of extraction. 

Such parasitic exploitation typically including other societies. 

Because every such transformation of order is always less than 100 percent efficient (usually much less) then every time there is extraction there is loss of order, i.e. increase of entropy. So that the more finance, industry, trade, exchange, complexity of organization is generated and sustained; the greater must be the increase in disorder which is its price.

Indeed, such processes are not zero-sum (whereby the positive/ good/ creative is merely a re-arrangement of what went before); but less-than-zero-sum - because we always end-up with less of the good stuff than we began-with.  

Such a less-than-zero-sum world view is (I infer) explicit among the leadership classes - it is (I think) a "dirty secret" about geopolitics; something shared among the social strategists in private; and a secret by which they are initiated-into the power club.

And because this class of people have either excluded the divine and creative as unreal, or else (at the highest levels) explicitly joined with the demonic alliance against God; these people "know" that they "themselves" can only thrive - can only be prosperous, powerful, comfortable, and have pleasurable lives -  by destruction of others. 

The conviction is that - in an ultimate and absolute sense; "their" well-being (both physical and psychological, and indeed spiritual) is only achievable via actual destruction of the well-being of others. 

They "understand" that to generate what "they" desire, necessarily entails a greater volume of destruction of what "other people" desire. 

This is the dirty secret by which they operate. 

And this is what is happening, all the time and all over the place - it is the world-view that drives Western strategic policies of all kinds - although this is covert, except among the higher human leadership class (i.e. many national "leaders" and CEOs of big corporations are ignorant of this reality - believing in ideological nonsense and serving only as manipulated puppets).  

Western Geopolitics is a combination of the (Ahrimanic) totalitarian desire for control and social order as primary goal; with the recognition that this can only be achieved for a small and shrinking minority and by means of (Sorathic) destructive-exploitation of the majority. 

The driving belief is that the greater the destruction of the mass majority, the more "order" and "energy" will be liberated for exploitation...

The greater the scale of mass collapse into social dysfunctionality - the greater the scope there shall be for generating small islands of order and purpose; by transmutation of the energies and potentialities of a collapsing world, into that which they desire for themselves. 

At the highest level of anti-God, anti-creation evil, the demons understand that this vastness of destruction consumes itself, and the number of those who "benefit" from parasitic destruction will necessarily always be shrinking, and as matters proceed that shrinkage will be more rapid; and that the end can only be a kind of universal death. 

But meanwhile, they derive vast satisfaction from covertly engineering the process of exploitation - and especially that the masses who are destined (if plans go right) to be consumed and annihilated, in order to extract their positive energies are consenting to this. 

In sum - there is a duality to the current nature of global evil; by which those whose desire is to maintain order and functionality - i.e. the Ahrimanic totalitarians, bureaucrats, managers etc - operate on the basis that this is only possible by social destruction elsewhere. 

The basis of current geopolitics is that the survival and thriving of The System (and "my" place in that system) is achievable only by increasing overall chaos - because order must consume order, always at the cost of increasing total entropy. 

Because they believe that parasitic destruction is fundamental to reality; the Western leadership class is therefore purposively creating chaos all over the world, as well as within their "home" societies - as the "fuel" they need to maintain their position - for a while, anyway. 

And this is done with a clear conscience, and indeed a sense of virtue; since "they" regard parasitic destruction as an unavoidable reality - and themselves as superior by knowledge of this tragic reality - hence most deserving to be the "winners" in the inevitable process. 

And they also recognize that this process must of its nature accelerate, as the negentropy of the masses is consumed; and recognize too that the membership of the parasitic ruling class must shrink - which is why there is so much, and accelerating, "civil war" among them. 

Is all this true and inevitable? It parasitic destruction that nature of ultimate reality?

Of course not! 

This demonic world view of the necessity and desirability of parasitic destruction; is a product of fundamental assumptions, of personal commitments to the metaphysical principle that there is no God and no divine creation...

Or, at a more advanced level of evil; the personal conviction that God and Creation are evils that should be opposed; and joining the side of those who oppose these. 

The way out (the only way out) from the "imperatives" of this mainstream, global geopolitical alliance - which regards destructive evil as necessary and "good" - is to know the reality of God as personal, good, loving, the creator - and to join our-selves to the side of the divine. 

Note added: To put it another way... Because our society and civilization has no belief in the reality and primacy of God and divine creation - it cannot be motivated by any concept of positive good. Any and all apparent public examples of generally accepted good; turn-out to be double-negative in form. this means that "doing good" is ultimately, bottom-line, a matter of destroying (or otherwise eliminating) "evil" - so destruction is baked-into modern ethics, that is all there is. Furthermore; all evil is defined in negative psychological terms; in terms of pain, misery, suffering... To a remarkable extent, therefore, ethical behaviour, "doing good" is a matter of eliminating whatever makes "me" and "us" happier or less unhappy. Doing good on a global scale, therefore becomes the business of weakening and destroying any nation or groups by which we personally (and those of whom we approve) feel threatened. And this is what we find.  

Why engage with mass media At All?

People writing (online) often claim to be disengaged from mass media (in which I include social media) - or having a "fast" from it. But in reality this (much lake fasting from food) this does not mean a total cessation of contact, but actually means being selective and cutting down the amount of what is consumed. 

This is because the mass media is so pervasive and attention-grabbing that one could only avoid it by ceasing social (and economic) activity. 

Furthermore, and increasingly, participation is mandatory - for example in the dissemination of official and corporate information, and access to restricted services, it is assumed/ insisted that people have smart phones with them at all times. 

I notice this, because I don't have an SP - but that is only possible because I have retired from work, and am prepared to do-without some permissions and conveniences. And also because all my family have smartphones, and I sometimes substitute my eight-inch "tablet" computer.

But for most people, significant levels of exposure to the mass media is literally unavoidable - so the best and most that can be managed is (as I said) to be selective and reduce the amount and time-spent in usage and consumption. 

To have significant chunks of time away from it. 

Is there any positive reason to engage with mass media? 

Well, of course - like almost everything - the media are only evil overall, and not in every respect. So selectivity can - in principle, lead us to engage more with good stuff, and minimize severely the bad stuff. 

Yet, the bad stuff cannot altogether be avoided; partly because it is everywhere (including in public spaces) and partly from our own inevitable weaknesses that will prevail at times, and probably often. 

One other thing I would mention as potentially helpful, is to get an idea of what the totalitarian Establishment are trying to do to us - what is their overall and long-term strategy for Mankind; and what is their current propaganda preparing us for? 

We get this, pretty much, from observing our own spontaneous responses, and the responses of people around us, to this kind of media manipulation. 

By asking how does this "story" or "information" make me feel - and how does it affect people around me? 

That is, probably, pretty-much what it was intended to do. 

Since the Litmus Test issues (large and smaller) are strategic, they include easily-detected unsubtle and direct attempted manipulations, as well as indirect and subtler "soft sell" aspects. 

These can be picked-up and self-monitored quite quickly, without need for sustained engagement - and the initial harms they will do us, can be dealt with - and made the basis for spiritual learning...

If we are ready and willing to repent our own inevitable and frequent sins - which as Christians we always ought to be!

 

Is it a contradiction that modern people are so aggressively moralistic; while rejecting purpose, meaning and personal significance in reality?

Is it a contradiction that modern people are so aggressively moralistic; while rejecting purpose, meaning and personal significance in reality? 

We live in a social world of continual, inescapable, aggressive moralizing; despite that almost everybody professes to reject and disbelieve in any basis for morality in reality (reality is regarded as the neutral product of causality, as described by "science").

Indeed, this foundation-less ideology is the basis of the System of global totalitarianism - so its aggressive and compulsory arbitrary-ness is (albeit incoherently!) propagandized-to and enforced-upon billions of people!  

I think there is something very modern about this mind-set. 

In the historical past; I strongly suspect that such a total lack of moral foundations as is now normal, would have led to a situation of "amorality" - in which people had few, feeble and diffidently expressed moral convictions - and would not (as modern do) lead to such amoral individuals spending most their lives advertising their own moral superiority, and opining on the "evils" of various hate-groups...

And engaging in "activism" aggressively to impose "this morning's" pseudo-imperative on everybody else - but especially directed against those are said to who adhere to "yesterday afternoon's" moral principles. 

Much can - and should! - be said about this profoundly strange and destructive state of affairs. 

First, and I think neglected; is that aggressive moralizing is not an index of moral conviction.

I mean that the fact so many people are engaged in seek-and-destroy activities against those who disagree with them is Not evidence of such a person's own state of moral conviction - it is Not evidence of his possessing a strong and sure belief in the morality being implemented.

Indeed; the opposite is usually the case! 

In the modern world, among modern people; the more loudly and aggressively somebody enforces his morality upon others - the less likely it is that he is himself convinced by that morality. 

I have very-often observed this for myself. 

When an aggressive modern moralizer himself begins to become aware of the insecurity of his own publicly affirmed convictions - aware of the fact that they are incoherent and self-contradictory - the more aggressive he becomes!...

He will rant and rage at the absolute importance of imposing his current moral whims; and this aggression has almost no limit of extremity. 

Alternatively, such extremity of emotion may cause a decomposition and breakdown - with (again very public) weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth - apparently presented as "evidence" of the rightness and solidity of his own currently-dominating moral imperatives.  

What is going on here is that the personal element of morality is accepted by mainstream modern people; but this erodes, indeed eliminates, the rationale for making this into a public morality. Therefore the public morality is un-founded, therefore the rationale for its imposition is in fact psychological. 

This creates a reversal. The individual believes that his morality is objectively-true, right and necessary because he feels aggressively that it must be imposed...

And/or the morality is objectively-true, right and necessary because anyone who contradicts it, makes him terribly, terribly upset and miserable. 

In sum: the here-and-now extremity of "my" emotion, is being regarded as the main "evidence" of objective reality. 

Of course, all this kind of stuff is primarily an attribute of the mainstream atheist-materialist "Leftists" who dominate the leadership and management classes of the Western totalitarian pseudo-nations. 

But it is also an attribute of the majority of those who profess to be anti-modern, and pro-tradition; because no matter how religious a modern person may be in his social niche choices - he is still a modern person living in the contemporary world. 

Modern traditionalists of religion have necessarily made a choice to adhere to whatever morality and value-system to which they adhere; and the grounds for that choice always therefore constitute a personal commitment.  

When a modern person aggressively imposes his personal commitment on other people - there arises (whether unconsciously or consciously) the uncomfortable sense of contradiction. 

The ideological or religious system has been chosen, and the grounds for choice cannot help but be rooted in some personal factors - because in the modern world there is no single and inevitable coherent moral system that will be absorbed from "society" - but instead many, many such value-systems; all contested and changeable, usually asserted by different "authorities" - the authoritative status of which is also contested. 

Personal choice of values including morals is therefore inescapable - because it is evidently the way that modern people are made, and the way modern society actually-is. 

It's a fact of life, like it or not... And modern religious traditionalists do Not like it!

This is the psychological basis of the extreme moralistic aggression with which traditionalists approach those who disagree with them. 

The hair-trigger escalation of aggressive statement into aggressive rant, and even into aggressive (including passive-aggressive) threats - which is so common a behaviour among religious traditionalists of all stripes - is therefore evidence of the same kind of insecurity as seen in mainstream left-ideologists. 

I mean that the one is an ideological insecurity; whereas the other is a religious insecurity - in fact a metaphysical - insecurity; and both are rooted in the inevitably personal choice of morality and values in the modern mind in the modern world - a personal choice that "must" be denied in order to make that choice into objective necessity. 

What I'm saying is that while both secular-atheists and religious traditionalists claim that their anger and intransigence are a consequence of the objective validity and necessity of their moral assertions...

I am instead stating that their anger and intransigence are consequences of the - psychologically unacceptable - actuality that their moral assertions are rooted in personal choosing. 

In other words, their aggressive behaviour is not rooted in objective necessity; but is a consequence of the denied knowledge that the aggressively-asserted moral objectivity is rooted in their own subjective emotions and choices.  

The personal anger or upset is being used to underpin pseudo-objective assertion. 

Without their extremity of emotion, they might be compelled to recognize the subjective necessity that roots their publicly-affirmed ideological or religious impositions. 

In order to sustain their public stance; they need their own aggression! 

That's why they cannot and will-not give it up!

  

Nothing like a ball: Instead of appointing mediocre middle managers or psychopaths as leaders; what should churches do?

Are you inspired?

As the Church of England appoints yet another mediocre middle manager as its Chief Executive - indeed, aside from being called "Sarah"; this one is as close to an archetypal Karen is is humanly possible. 

(Even within the National Health Service - that most bureaucratic of bureaucracies - I speak from experience; to be a career "Nursing Officer" is near the very pinnacle of officious dysfunctionality, dullness and futility.)

This appointment is representative of the CofE's mainstream roadmap of institutional survival - which is to convert church buildings into "community centres" - with meeting and social rooms for hire, café, musical events (my local church will soon be hosting a Miley Cyrus "tribute" concert...); with church activities focused on mainstream-left-approved socio-political "activism".  

At this point it might be worth reflecting upon what a any Christians who still exist within the major church structures might instead do - other than the alternative MBA-approved path of appointing as "leader" some kind of a charismatic, asset-stripping, con-artist, and psychopath*.

The answer is simple, but unpopular - which is to strive by all possible means to make church activities deep, serious, and spiritual. 

A place where the services are intended to induce fundamental thought; and where it is hoped (if possible) to encourage a higher and spiritual consciousness.

This assumes that there are at least some people who are motivated to want this - perhaps want it with a profound yearning; but who find depth, seriousness and spiritual consciousness to be utterly lacking in the superficialities and sloganism of mainstream culture and mainstream churches.

Such a change cannot possibly come from appointing a church leader from any conceivable list of qualified and/or acceptable candidates - since none of these people even desire what is needed but the opposite; all of these have been selected, propagandized, and trained to serve the requirements of our totalitarian System. 

The trouble is that most church-goers, including those most active; apparently seek almost Anything But what I have suggested. 

They want instead a nice and social situation, a sensation of "doing good" in some generically-approved fashion; with some cheerful singing and a bit of picturesque or colourful "ceremony".

My "advice" to churches will strike actually-existing church-members as analogous to that of Caroline Bingley in Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice: 

“I should like balls infinitely better," she replied, "if they were carried on in a different manner; but there is something insufferably tedious in the usual process of such a meeting. It would surely be much more rational if conversation instead of dancing were made the order of they day." 

"Much more rational, my dear Caroline, I dare say, but it would not be near so much like a ball.” 

Actual churches want to stage a series of "balls" - whereas my suggestions are so radical as to make church nothing like a ball!

  

 *The USA is re-experiencing just how delusive it is to expect, or even hope, that such persons will act as guides and exemplars; in situations when this entails System-inexpedient, long-termist, principled behaviour. When we need a hero to save their people; we need to recognize that psychopaths are never heroes, they do not willingly suffer, or even take risks, for their people - because ultimately they are always motivated by working for themselves. 

Magical duels between early Christian missionaries and Druids of the British Isles

Saint Patrick magically duels a Druid

In the Roman and post-Roman era; the early Christian missionaries to the British Isles were highly successful at converting the Druidic pagans. 

This may suggest a basic religious compatibility; such that Christianity may have seemed like a natural extension or complement of the Druidic religion. 

For instance; according to Julius Caesar, the Celts of Gaul and Britain seem to have been exceptionally courageous in battle because they did not fear death; being convinced that they would personally survive death in some mode of reincarnation back into this mortal life. 

In a context where personal survival was already an established conviction; the Christian missionaries promise of resurrected eternal life in a Heaven, rather than merely returning to re-live "more-of-the-same", may have been regarded as a significantly better prospect. 

But, even if the post-mortal Christian outcome was better than what Druids could offer; there was the problem of establishing the missionary's authority to promise it. 

After all; why should a Celtic tribal King believe the word of some foreign priest who turned-up at his hall telling a story about the afterlife?  

A Christian missionary would therefore need to establish his own divine authority; and this would usually (it seems) be done by performing "wonders" with divine aid: wonders such as miracles, and also defeating the existing priesthood in trials of spiritual-strength.

This was done to prove the new God was stronger than the old ones, and prove that the new kind of priest spoke with divine authority.   

One such trial of spiritual strength was some variation of the magical duel - analogous to that in the Old Testament (Exodus 7: 8-13) between Aaron and the Pharoah's magical priests - the episode of the magical staffs and the snakes. 

It is important to recognize that the magic of Pharoah's wise Men is depicted as real; but weaker than the magic of Aaron and Moses.

Much the same things were reported in the evangelization of the British Isles, as John Michell summarizes in his 1990 book New light on the ancient mystery of Glastonbury ( pp103-4: I have condensed this passage):   

The great mystery behind early Christianity in Britain is how the first missionaries managed to persuade the chiefs, nobles and Druids to lead their people in converting to the new faith of Christ. Certainly there was opposition, but there is no record of violence or bloodshed. 

Contests between the rival men of religion took place on a professional level, as trials between rival magicians. We only hear about those engagements where Christians won, but it appears that their magic was generally superior to that of their opponents. 

Thus St Patrick prevailed over the Druids of Tara, St Columba defeated the Druids of Bruidh, and St David won a contest with the magician Boia. 

In times when the outcomes of battles were largely determined by the powers of the Druids on each side, a compelling inducement to accept Christianity was that Christian magic proved more effective than that of the pagans.  

The arts of ancient magic are no longer known and it is impossible to say by what combinations of psychology, conjuring, weather control, and elemental invocation; prehistoric battles were conducted. 

It is clear, however, that (unlike Christian magic) the magic of tribal shamans was ineffectual against outsiders of a different religion.

My understanding is that in ancient times magic was real and powerful, and could (in some civilizations) reliably be deployed as required (for instance, to build the pyramids). 

Nowadays, I think magic is still real, still happens; but evidently it is weaker and much less reliable than in the past. Thus; magic cannot nowadays be commanded in ways that seem to have been normal (at least for suitable gifted and trained persons) in Biblical times, or in the early centuries AD.

Nonetheless; it seems only honest to recognize that (bowdlerisations aside) early Christians used magic, as well as other types of miracle, to establish their credentials as speaking with authority on behalf of Jesus. 

Indeed; the remarkable effectiveness of early British missionaries (including those who later became Saints) was sometimes due precisely to the greater effectiveness of the new Christian magic, as compared with the old magic of rival pagan priests.  

 

Christianity is a ladder - not a scaffolding

To become a Christian is to climb a ladder; but after we have arrived at Christianity, we should kick away the ladder. 

Christianity is Not, therefore, some kind of an elaborate and specific scaffolding that our faith necessarily stands upon; Not a particular form of platform-support that must be assembled and maintained Just-So - or else it will collapse, bringing-down the faith and salvation of all who stand upon it... 

Very briefly stated: the place of Christianity is where we know the reality and nature of God; have understood what Jesus Christ offers us - and committed to accepting that gift.  

Once we know God and have chosen to follow Jesus - the ladder by-which we climbed to that place could, and probably should, be discarded...

Because otherwise our faith may come to depend on the perceived-integrity of the ladder - so that anything which seems wrong with the ladder will threaten our commitment. 

The evidences and experiences which constitute a ladder to Christianity, are as various as people. 

It may be some combination of a church or scriptures, or another institution, persons or books; or it may be some life experience - good or bad, happy or sad, joyous or suffering...

To reach the place of Christianity; we may have climbed a ramshackle, crooked, and botched ladder; built from poor quality and weak materials, and including elements that have no good reason to be included.

None of that matters - so long as we do not feel obliged to defend the truth and integrity of every rung and the straightness and strength of the uprights! 

So long as we do not come to believe that our ladder is the perfect, only possible, and inevitably effective means of ascent!  

If your particular ladder is causing problems to your faith: then kick it away!

Creative artist envy is a mistake

This is the creativity of ecstatic engagement - 

which is valid regardless of its communication or appreciation 

I have been re-engaging with the work and person of Glenn Gould recently - a recurrent activity in my life ever since I discovered him in autumn 1978. 

Something that crops-up is that Gould, in some sense, "wanted to be a composer"... but never quite got around to it (producing a small handful of apprentice or light pieces merely); despite circling around this idea for some thirty-off years, and despite being par excellence somebody who did what he wanted the way he wanted.

And despite "re-composing" many of the pieces he played; at least in the sense of sometimes ignoring performing traditions and composers markings (e.g. for tempo and dynamics) alike.  

This could be regarded as an example of "composer envy" - a condition that afflicts many of the more thoughtful performing musicians - including the greatest conductors; who perhaps get nearest to composition without actually doing it. 

There is, it is often assumed, a scale of creative activity, in music that has the great composer at the top (Bach, Mozart, Beethoven etc); great conductors next (e.g. Toscanini, Stokowski, von Karajan); and then the great performers of the various instruments - with piano pre-eminent. 

But this is the top-end of another common assumption among those who appreciate the arts; that to be any kind of creative artists is intrinsically "more creative" than... anything else. 

So that being a musician is intrinsically a creative activity - as is novelist, poet, painter or another of the arts. 

So there is an "artist envy" among those who are not artists - on the basis that artists are more creative than non-artists. 

However, none of this is really true at the individual level. 

By my judgment; Gould was actually a far more creative person than any of the classical composers of his era. Great Classical music was not being composed in the second half of the twentieth century, nor since (although there has been a fair bit of good and worthwhile classical music.). 

I mean that the actual, recognized and prestigious, classical music composers from the 1950s onward, do not succeed in their creating to anything like the extent of Gould himself. 

Creatively-speaking; Gould really had nothing to envy among his contemporaries among composers. 

A similar situation exists with respect to poetry. I think there still exists a kind of "poet envy" among writers - I mean the idea that "everybody really wants to be a poet"... 

(Or, if not a poet, then a novelist or playwright.)

And yet, the actuality is that there has not been (IMO) a great poet in our Anglophone Western culture in the past half century and more (and very little real poetry of any kind or quality) - so what is there to envy? ... 

Nothing; except an unearned reputation for creativity in poets. 

To circle back to Gould; what his example teaches me is that our greatest creativity is found by pursuing our personal gifts and motivations - and not by trying to fulfil society-wide notions of creative activity. 

Gould succeeded in leading an exceptionally creative life- - mainly as a performer, but also there was a mosaic of other and complementary creativity in his radio documentaries, his rhapsodic essayistic writings - and even in his interviews. 

That is one thing. 

Secondarily; Gould was able to communicate his ecstatic states, insights and perspectives to a very high degree. That is why he the fascinating figure that he is; among those in sympathy with his nature and ideals.

This ability to communicate was rooted in Gould's exceptional abilities as a pianist, which were both technical-pianistic, and also expressive of a very high aptitude as "a musician". 

By saying that Gould was "a musician" at a high level; I refer to Gould's capacity to understand music - as contrasted with the ability to play it. 

It is possible, indeed usual, to have the one without the other - and to have both musicianship and performing technique at a high level, is very rare

The lesson from this secondary aspect of creativity is that high aptitude is not generalizable (almost by definition). 

That is: we can learn from Gould's primary creativity, because there are aspects of unique and valuable creativity in everybody - but we cannot learn from Gould's rare gifts of deep musicality and technical accomplishment, which are those aspects that made him a great communicator.   

The capacity to communicate primary creativity - to share one's own creativity with others - is something that cannot be depended-on: or, more accurately, something that we ought not to build our creative endeavours around.  

In other words: is not a matter of particular activities, jobs or roles; but instead something that is an aspect of our real selves. 

Everybody ought to be creative, ought to live-creatively - and creativity is a reality. 

Creativity is, ultimately, to live from-oneself in harmony with divine creation. 

It is a matter of contributing the consequences of our uniqueness of nature to divine creation.

What that actually means - for you and me, in actual practice - should be calibrated inwardly. 

Half-baked - yet pervasive - notions of artist-envy must be seen-through and set-aside; because creativity is not a social role; 

To be-creative is not (or, not for many people, and only for a few people) to be one or other kind of socially-recognized artist or other creative type. And even within creative types (musician, writer, visual artist) there is no objective hierarchy.

And we need to realize that the whole business of "living creatively" is often, I would say usually, muddied and corrupted by conflating it with the business of being appreciated and recognized by other people. 

In sum: We can and should all aspire to be creative, which all can do; but only a very few can ever be - or should ever be - publicly acknowledged as a creative artist that can communicate his vision.   

In the Western civilization now and for several generations; to be a recognized and prestigious "artist" of some kind, is close to being a guarantee of low-level or utterly-absent creativity of living; when creativity is correctly understood. 

Real-inner creativity and acknowledged-outer creativity are almost wholly dissociated: one exists usually in the absence of the other. 

The psychology of "creativity" is distinct from the sociology: the private from the public. 

This fact needs to be recognized if we are each to live as well as we might. 

  

NOTE ADDED: On reflection: This post doesn't seem to make its point very lucidly! I suppose what I'm trying to say is that in pursuing creativity, we ought not to be guided by cultural ideas of what constitute legitimate creative activities. Nor should we aim-at or push-for public recognition for whatever creative stuff we decide to do. Insofar as this happens naturally - fine. But the more we are trying to promote the product of our creative work, the less here-and-now creative we will become. In other words; what really mattes is active and aware creativity today (in whatever domain we intuit to be destined) - not praise and accolades for some-thing we feel to have been insufficiently-appreciated (a picture, poem, novel, performance - or whatever) that we did last week/ month/ year, or in our youth. And we should strive to be pleasing to our deepest selves and to God - or a handful of people we respect; rather than to focus on hopes of material or cultural rewards. 

Western Geopolitics and "You just go around the house... Creating!"

My mother, who (in stark contrast to her eldest child) was a wonderful housekeeper; used often to say to me - in an extremity of exasperation - "You just go around the house... Creating!" 

By which she meant I was disrupting and disordering her meticulous and laboriously-achieved state of neatness and convenience; for instance by carrying cups of tea or coffee, heaps of books and papers, around the house, taking off and dropping pullovers or socks - sitting in the midst of an island of mess...

And then leaving such messes behind, whenever I moved on to the next location. 

Now I know - from decades of failure - how very difficult it is to maintain a functional household; I can see that she was right to chastise me. 

At the time, I could not see what the fuss was about. After all, things just (apparently) tidied themselves. Something carelessly discarded would miraculously reappear in its proper place...

My mother's bit of Northumbrian dialect, was based in an implied oxymoronic phrase related to "creating" chaos. 

I now find this notion to be very interesting - I mean the idea of creating-chaos; because - by my best and deepest metaphysical understanding - creation and chaos are in truth opposites. 

...So that if one is really creating, one must thereby be reducing chaos - and if one is actually inducing chaos, then one is destroying the-created. 

Anyway, pedantry aside; what was implied by my Mother's phrase was:

The process of (at best) care-less, but often deliberately-motivated; reduction of the-created towards a state of disorder, mutual conflict, dysfunctionality... chaos. 

In other words; my Mother's phrase characterizes the long-term and systematic geopolitical behaviour of Western civilization since around the millennium (and the end of the Eastern Bloc): 

They/ we just go around around the world... Creating: that is to say - creating chaos. 

And this strategy is pursued over the long-term and by multiple means: such as bribery and corruption (aka. "foreign aid"). "International Law" and multinational organizations are part of this. 

Also economic pressures of many kinds, such as "sanctions" (which are actually directed mainly at causing chaos within the West, but sometimes have the desired side-effect of causing chaos abroad). 

There is, of course, war-all-over-the-place - and the attempts to induce more and bigger wars; by multi-pronged campaigns (and staging of "incidents") to induce previously amicable/ tolerant neighbours into becoming bitter enemies - and to keep things that way. 

This is happening All The Time - both at a large scale (e.g. in Asia) and at a smaller scale (e.g. in Europe). 

One "excuse" is (presumably) to weaken enemies, so that "we" may be relatively stronger... and thereby "do more good" for these other places. 

But that excuse is shown as a lie by the top-down and simultaneous deliberate weakening of the West; and the fact that we do not believe that we are good. 

Indeed, being atheist materialists - we lack any positive conceptualization of what good actually is; and instead suppose ourselves to be fighting evils of various (fluidly defined) types.  

The euphemistically termed "colour revolutions" - that are those Western-planned/ -funded/ -media-supported overturnings of national governments (all over the place; within the West as well as anywhere/ everywhere else) - especially by those themselves incapable of government - so as to install puppet regimes... 

New governments which lack native legitimacy, hence never last, hence lead to civil disorder or war - and other kind of chaos... 

This has been done dozens of times since 1990; and the pace of global disruption is still increasing! 

At present hardly a week goes-by without some such attempt, and many are "successful". Regimes are changed.  

However, the invariable result of "successful" West-induced regime change turns-out always to be chaotic, dysfunctional, damaging. Because, either there is careless indifference as to outcomes (so long as there is short-term selfish profit), or else destructive chaos is the real and covert motivation from the get-go.    

"More chaos" happens a lot nowadays, because - in an entropic universe - inducing chaos is Much easier than creation: much easier than creating cooperation, functionality, predictability. 

But It Was Not Always Thus!

Consider the Roman Empire. Yes, it was a crushing top-down tyranny with many bad features; but there is no doubt that it created greater cooperation and greater civilizational-functionality on a global scale. 

The Romans, unlike the modern West, did not purposively and over the long-term destroy societal functionality, did not deliberately "create" wars and economic chaos, did not encourage and fund agents of destruction. 

The Romans did not induce net-chaos; because they (unlike "us) had other, better, more positive things that they were trying to accomplish. 

Compare the Romans with what happens at present!  

The Roman Civilization - and indeed a Roman Household - aimed-at (and sometimes achieved) a society that was clean, well-ordered, and effective. 

This did not happen by accident, nor as a by-product of deliberately inducing and sustaining chaos. 

Like the household of my childhood; Roman coordinated functionality happened because of clear purposes and plans, hard work, rigorous monitoring, and as a consequence of great efforts and labour*.

And this was possible because of what-was-good in the Roman Civilization. 

Top-down, purposive functionality does Not happen nowadays, because there is extremely little that is good among those with power and in leadership positions in Western civilization. 

Or, to put it more accurately; because Western civilization is controlled by those whose affiliations are overwhelming evil, demonic; anti-God: anti-divine creation. 

And the reason for this is clear and simple: the Romans were very religious. 

They recognized the reality of gods, spirits, and of transcendental values and purposes. 

Roman lives were permeated by religious devotions, and a religious perspective. 

For a Roman, including the Roman ruling class and their servants: life therefore had ultimate purpose, therefore meaning; and this "Roman" meaning was linked to each Roman-person as a member of Roman society, a Roman family - a Roman role or job that contributed to the whole. 

However, for our ruling class, in complete contrast, life has no purpose, no meaning, no personal relevance - except for a selfishness and hedonism that becomes ever more short-termist, and thus more easily manipulated by the demonic powers.  

Of course, none of this strategic and purposive "Creating (of chaos)" by Western civilization is explicitly stated - of course, there are always pseudo-constructive, pseudo-moral, rationalizations for destruction.

Always "reasons" why it is a good thing for the West to intervene everywhere, "for their own good", and in the end always to destroy - both abroad and at home.   

Part of this disguise of motivation, is to propagate the false dichotomy of chaos versus order. 

Acceptance of this calculated-error allows Them to depict order as necessarily oppressive, and chaos as if it were creative. 

Any nation that is reasonably functional will - like the Roman Empire - necessarily contain many attributes of oppressive order; and (under the order versus chaos scheme) can therefore be depicted as objectively evil and deserving of partial (or even complete) destruction. 

So that West induced national chaos as a consequence of intervention - e.g. civil war, starvation, disease, mass maiming and death; is routinely spun as if we were doing them a favour! Making the nations of the world free from oppressive order, one after the other; and all from the goodness of our Western hearts!

"Supporting" a nation is thereby made wholly compatible with action leading to destroying masses of people and the functionality of that nation - often for many decades. This induced social collapse may then serve as an excuse for further intervention, or takeover - or looting of resources. 

Meanwhile the same is happening at home, within the West. Always it is disguised by quasi-moral reasons; characteristically combined either with indifference to actual outcomes (including lying about or ignoring outcomes); or else by relabeling increased chaos and collapsing functionality as good things - like diversity, equity, freedom, vibrancy!   

...Meanwhile actual creativity - which was our "USP" for several centuries - is at an all-time low in the West.

Ultimately because human creativity is real only when it is good; when it contributes to divine creation; but our civilization is now rooted in denial of the divine - which is de facto allegiance to Satan.  

The lesson from my Mother is that chaos is easy, functionality is difficult. 

Anyone indifferent or hostile to functionality has an easy time of getting what they want; and need not expend much effort in getting it.

Therefore; the first and indispensable step towards doing anything constructive about deliberate global rampant chaos; is to acknowledge and understand the nature and reality of divine creation.

And then our-selves affiliating to it. 

**   

 

*Note added: A functional civilization or society must genuinely operate in pursuit of higher (transcendental, hence positive) values; such that it believes-in these values, believes these values are good, attains self-respect from these values; and regards it as beneficial that these values be spread and enforced elsewhere. 

These positive values are what enables a society, sufficiently and overall, to pursue coordinated functionality - society is engineered in pursuit of these values. Without such over-arching, and transcendent, and positive values - society will disintegrate for lack of cohesive principles.  

Thus, in their heyday, the leadership and masses of both the Roman and British Empires regarded it as good to make foreigners Roman/ British. 

In both instances; the means to this end included religion primarily, laws and education consequentially - which were top-down and enforced on colonies. 

It was this underlying reality that led to the surface homogeneities of Roman/ British societies. 

FURTHER NOTE: I should not be understood as advocating a return to the values of the Roman, or even the British, Empire! What I am intending to highlight is that the civilizational dominance of these Empires both were rooted in a transcendental conviction of having positive values to impart. In other words; their sense of superiority was substantive, because it was religious. That is Not the case for Western civilization now: without any exception, all of its self-defining values are not merely negative but double-negative. And this is why Western civilization-as-is, is wholly oppositional - hence necessarily destructive in sum. 

It was a big mistake to conflate God the Creator and Jesus Christ (and the Holy Ghost)

Most Christian theologians through history have made the big mistake of conflating (in some theoretical/ mystical way) God the Creator with Jesus Christ. 

The mistake was made (IMO) because the theologians were monotheists first, and Christians only secondarily; such that they assumed the reality of Jesus's divinity "must" mean that he and God the Creator were ultimately One.

But this is untrue. 

Consequently there are plenty of rational people throughout the past two millennia who have coherently believed in God as Creator, but disbelieve the divinity of Jesus Christ - or reject what Jesus offered Mankind. 

Atheism on the one hand and non-Christian-theism (belief in God, but not the divinity of Jesus) on the other are - or should be - two different things; and they have different consequences.

 

To be a atheist is to reject purpose, meaning and the coherence of reality - it therefore renders the atheist self-trapped in a state of sustained irrationality:  a kind of insanity.  

A non-Christian theist may therefore be rational and coherent.

The difference that being a Christian makes is additive to coherence: it is hope. 

For the not-Christian theist there is no hope for himself. Himself-specifically does not matter, perhaps is unreal, or perhaps the self will dissolve. 

The not-Christian theist will therefore intrinsically regard mortal life as a tragedy - because it contains much evil, because it contains change/ entropy (ageing, disease and disaster) - and because it is inevitably terminated utterly, by the death of himself.    

So a Christian has hope of resurrection and eternal life in a Heaven without death or evil. 

But, so far, this hope is located only beyond death. 

To believe only in post-mortal salvation is to recognize the coherence of reality, and to anticipate joy in eternity - but, of itself alone, this makes our present mortal life into (at best) merely an inferior version of Heaven, a time of waiting. 

It is belief in the Holy Ghost - which I understand to be our experience of the living presence of Jesus during this mortal life - that converts the remote hope of post-mortal salvation into something that can, potentially, make our present lives into something better than a mere putting-off of Heaven. 

The Holy Ghost is what enables integration of our our personal and present life with both salvation to come, and the reality of this world as purposive, meaningful and coherent. 

The usual "Christian" (but actually dogmatically monotheist) habit-compulsion conceptually to conflate the nature and role of Father, Son and Holy Ghost; is therefore not merely a theological error, but leaves people permanently-confused and systematically-misled - about the consequences of not being fully-Christian.  

The divine "purpose" for individual persons: God gives us what we need (but Not Only what we need)

Each person's life has "meaning" - and that meaning is related to divine purpose. 

I think this is quite clear, if you know what to look for - in your own life, and the lives of those you know and love. 

I mean that people always (sooner or later) get the experience/s they most need for spiritual development. 

However, that does not mean that every individual "automatically" learns from each such experience -- Indeed, very often, it seems that people do not learn from personal experiences that could be of great personal benefit. 

Or else people learn something wrong and contrary to divine purpose, from experiences; they choose to lean a lesson contrary to God's hope and intentions. 

For instance; when some adverse experience that could be corrective if properly understood; is instead used as an excuse or rationale for doubling-down on some sin; such as fear, resentment, or despair. 

But what makes all this less obvious is that not all of life is related to divine purpose. 

It is the nature of this life and world we are currently experiencing that there is entropy/ death and there is evil. 

What this means is that things happen that are Not part of the divine purpose. 

What God the Creator can do and does; is make the best of these things. 

So that if some-thing happens to a person that is simply the result of entropy (some degenerative phenomenon or disease for example*); or a consequence of evil motivation or service to evil; then consequently God will create - such as later to enable something to be gained (or salvaged) from this adverse occurrence.   

All of this points at the need for discernment, because understanding and learning are inevitably confused and clouded by the nature of ourselves and this world; the process of discerning and learning is one requiring active participation and culminating in freedom to choose how to be, and where to go next. 

We must be able to discern which experiences are God given, and which are not. We must and inevitably do also work from our state of freedom. 

Creation is not something done-to-us. Divine purpose is that we participate in creation. 

And when an experience was not a part of divine purpose, we may need to be able to discern at what point God has (later) been able to present us with the possibility of deriving Good from evil. 

We make such discernments partly from that which is divine within-us; and partly (since the time of Jesus Christ) by guidance from the Holy Ghost... 

In other words, the capacity for true discernment is innate, and does not need to be derived from external sources - although, of course, external sources of guidance may be helpful in true discernment - just as external guidance is (here and now) more usually harmful. 

So much for this world we live-in, this mixed-world, this world that mixes divine creation and purpose with entropy and evil...

A further thing that God purposes that we learn is that this mixed world (the Primary Creation) may be escaped after death and the separation of our spirit from our incarnate form; because after death (and only after death) we may follow Jesus Christ through resurrection with eternal life; and into a Second Creation that is Heaven. 

Therefore, there will be divinely purposed experiences in this mortal life of ours (assuming we live long enough) that may be understood (if we are prepared to learn) as pointing towards the possibility of Resurrection and Heaven beyond death. 

i.e. Experiences that may (if we discern aright) be understood as pointing towards Salvation. 

Yet if, for whatever reason, we do not get such experiences during this mortal life (perhaps we die in the womb, or as infants) then such experiences as we need to be enabled to choose Heaven; will surely be provided after death. But again we are free to learn from them or not, and to choose Heaven or not. 

In sum: there is a divine purpose (or more than one purpose) for each person incarnated into this world; and this purpose is related to learning a lesson, or several lessons, during our life. 

Each person's purpose will be unique, because each person is unique - because each person had a pre-mortal spirit life before human incarnation  - which is why people are unique individuals from before birth. 

Because our purpose is unique, and because this world is a mixture of divinely created purpose with entropy and evil; discernment is required. We must recognize when we are being divinely taught; and when not...

But even when our life's happenings are due to evil Beings, or due to the innately entropic nature of this world - we should be alert to the ways in which divine creation can shape subsequent events, sooner-or-later to present us with possibilities for learning important life lessons.

Meaning and purpose are not "given": they need to be discerned...

We need to learn from them, and that is our job: we also need to learn the right (i.e. divinely intended) lessons from them.  

*Or death. The Fourth Gospel strongly suggests that death was regarded as The Number One Main Problem of life as-is-on-earth. Death is the problem that Jesus for which usually claims to be offering a solution. 

Christians should altogether stop saying "heathen" or "pagan" - when they mean (something like...) mainstream modern materialist atheists

The title says it all, pretty much. 

Christians should altogether stop saying "heathen" or "pagan" - since nowadays they don't exist - not really. 

Aside from the fact that both words originally meant something like rustics or country dwellers; ancient pagans and heathens were typically highly religious people; people who believed in the gods, the world of spirit, survival of the soul after death, and objective morality. 

As such, pagans and heathens bear near-zero resemblance to the great mass of not-Christians in the Western and developed world today. 

Nowadays, most people (including most self-identified Christians of whatever church or denomination) are this-worldly, materialist atheists. 

They/ we deny the reality or importance of the world of spirit; and believe that the universe of everything was/is not created - but instead arose and continued as a product of the operation of objective "scientific" factors that are alike indifferent to Humankind and each Man.

Nothing like modern materialist-atheists (i.e. like nearly all of us) was to be found in the ancient world. 

What is now normal, is something relatively new - merely several generations old.    

And the fact that there is no generally accepted term for almost-everybody-alive-now; is indirect evidence of how taken-for-granted this world-view has become. 

We need to adopt a new term to refer to this new kind of person, this new phenomenon; but to equate modern this-worldly, un-religious, aspiritual, anti-Christians with heathens and pagans, is just wrong. 

Notice: The Boss Baby (2017)

 

Having seen it at the cinema on release; I re-watched DreamWorks The Boss Baby (2017) yesterday, and really enjoyed it - even more than first time. 

The movie comes towards the tail end of that golden age of 3D animation which coincided with my kids growing -up; and which produced so many superb films that I think people got a bit blasé, and began to assume that this was "the norm", and could be expected to continue forever on autopilot. 

It wasn't and didn't; because excellence always depends on human ability and creativity - which is always in a limited supply. 

But this may explain why The Boss Baby didn't make more of an impact on release - because it is an excellent movie in almost every way - well scripted, structured, and edited; cleverly witty, very funny, inventive, and heart-warming.

There are some stunning sequences of animation, in various styles and with several themes, right from the very beginning; and these are kept very fresh and various. 

Although I did, as usual, find the inevitable finale of a long chase/ race against the clock to be the least good part of the movie - it had plenty of entertaining or affecting moments; but even the best of this genre (such as Toy Story 2, Monsters Inc, The Rise of the Guardians) seem to overdo this aspect of the plot arc - at least, for my taste. 

The Boss Baby even has a rather interesting and hard-hitting premise; which is that babies are not wanted by modern people in the way they used to be - and pets are often preferred (here, it is specifically cute puppies that are the main competition). 

The over-arching moral message is valid and somewhat counter-cultural: based on the life ideal of a loving family; and that having this is better than a successful career. 

In sum: people who like this sort of thing, will find TBB the sort of thing they like. 

Saturday morning music (and clog dancing) - Shane Cook and Emily Flack

I suggest it is impossible not to enjoy this video of a young woman clog dancing in a barn, accompanied by virtuoso fiddle and shoe-taps. 

**

(This is Irish style, 'tho' done by Canadians - for some English clog dancing see this.)

"Will power" characterized the spirituality of the religious elite during the era of Medieval consciousness

Religions, as we know them, emerged in the era of Medieval consciousness  - which was a millennia-long transition between the immersive passive un-consciousness of Original Participation and the current alienated Modern consciousness. 

There were (perhaps) two main forms of religion - one for the masses, the other for elite religious specialists. 

The Medieval mass consciousness was based on obedience to the religious institutions; and spiritual participation was made possible by intermediary phenomena; such as symbol, ritual, scripture, song - or social dynamics. 

The Medieval elite consciousness was based upon control of the whole person by "will power"; that is by human will aligned with divine will. 

The basic idea of Medieval era elite consciousness; was that a human being might discover the divine will; and then organized his life around the process of getting his own will into accord with the divine - and the totality of his behaviour into accord with his own divine-aligned will. 

So, the religious life was about prolonged discipline and training (e.g. varieties of initiation); aiming towards conscious goals. 

If successfully, the will was directed at the divine, and mastered all aspects of behaviour; to produce a transformed person (the higher type being described in various terms - holy, enlightened, an adept etc).  

Since the religious elites led the masses - and the obedience of the masses was directed at the religious elites - it was vital that there was sufficient alignment between elite and divine will. 

Usually - in most places, most of the time - there was not sufficient human-divine alignment. 

But sometimes and in some places there was; so it remained a valid ideal; especially in a world where individual consciousness was not much developed in most people. 

This idea of subordinating the whole of life to an elite will (purportedly aligned with the divine will) was "a good thing" insofar as the human will really was aligned with the divine will. 

And also insofar as the Medieval mode of consciousness infused this process of deployment of human will with "the spirit"... 

Because otherwise the whole thing was merely legalism - with all the ambiguities and imprecision intrinsic to the interpretation of language

It is this second aspect of the spirit infusing the human will, that has changed so much in the modern era - such that now the religious elites seldom even claim seriously to to be highly-aligned with divine will. 

Indeed, elite religious authority is usually based upon the same modes as the secular - that is to say institutional legitimacy, laws, rules, guidance understood as normal language (and in practice interpreted in the secular ways that such language is interpreted - e.g. legalistically, by historical and linguistic analysis, quasi-scientifically etc).  

What the modern era is left-with; is therefore the forms of Medieval consciousness, but minus the spontaneous spiritual infusion that used to accompany these forms. 

This, I think, is a reason why the Medieval forms are so badly-disenchanted; and exhibit such a dry, monochrome, dull, "school dinners" atmosphere...

Lacking spiritual infusion, their motivate only feebly, sometimes imperceptibly feebly; and consequently the elite religious specialists become assimilated into mainstream elite social mores: which are currently those of bureaucratic totalitarianism; hence evil; hence anti-Christian. 

(This can explain why the church leaders are the primary conduit for this-worldly and socio-politically-expedient corruption in the major Christian churches.)

And this, in turn, is why so many of the religious elite have turned away from them to immerse in the psychological gratifications - e.g. political spectacle-excitement, media entertainment, self-gratifying pseudo-moralism, therapies and palliatives - of mainstream secular culture. 

"Successful" churches are nowadays enterprises; providing meeting places and organizing holidays, staging events, serving as cafes and theatres, hosting social and health services - and so forth. 

This, then, is our situation. The aim, I presume; if our Christian life is to be strongly-enough motivated to transcend the pervasive pressure of secular society - is for each of us is to seek "enchantment" - i.e. infusion by divine spirit. 

...That same spiritual infusion that Mankind enjoyed in the past - but accepting that this is not possible either by passive immersion or by mediating phenomena. In sum: We need to seek the spirit actively and consciously - or else it will not happen. 

And we need to seek to integrate our-selves not by will power - which is now alienated from the divine. Nor by integration with the unconscious - from which we are detached, and which is anyway not Christian. 

But instead by seeking re-connection with our own partially-divine, eternal, original selves that are currently cut-off and alienated -- both by modern culture; and cut-off also by the forms of Medieval religion without the spirit. 

Because it is our eternal self that is in direct contact with the divine; and which therefore knows when it is aligned with God - and when it is (usually) more or less in a state of disharmony with creation - i.e. sin.  

For us; will power, and the disciplined seeking of conscious goals that characterized elite religious life in the Medieval era of consciousness; needs to be secondary to seeking divine-motivation, and divine-guidance and correction, by this inner-directed seeking consciously to establish direct-contact with our eternal selves.  

This is something new and unprecedented; and therefore difficult - but not so difficult as it may seem. The first step is to recognize what is wanted; then to recognize when it happens...

And the third step is not to expect too much! 

What is needed is sufficient Christian motivation to be able to navigate a Christian life in a hostile world - the ability to discern and the commitment to choose the divine and reject the demonic. 

We do not need, and shall not achieve, permanent and pervasive personal transformation for-the-better! 

We will neither become holy nor enlightened persons (unless we already are these things). 

But what is attainable; is a steady and robust desire to follow Jesus to resurrected eternal life in Heaven.