Friends, a few thoughts on dogma and reality, from my book Muddy Tracks.
“Interestingly enough, this sketch of the way I now see the world encompasses Bob Monroe’s description of earth-bound individuals as part of a larger being that exists primarily in a region beyond what he calls the Time-Space Illusion. This larger being sends out probes to experience earth life; the probes live as if they were separate beings, and at physical death they reunite not only with the part of the larger being that stayed outside what I call 3D Theater, but also with the others who were in the physical. But Monroe’s description also passes for a good description of God as he is understood in the Christian, Jewish and Moslem traditions. In fact, it corresponds with descriptions handed down by mystics and other wanderers in realms beyond 3D Theater….
“The implications of these few statements are immense, literally changing from birth to death and beyond. If you once see us as all connected through a larger being, many otherwise puzzling reports become matters of common sense. They become, in fact, only what is to be expected. Communication with the dead? Telepathy? Distant healing? Ghosts? Our society has opinions on all of them; all over the landscape. Knowledge? Not to be found. And this goes double for the ultimate questions. Is there an afterlife? Does God exist? Do spirits exist? If so, in both cases, do they concern themselves with human lives? Of these things, our society teaches nothing because it knows nothing. Indeed, silently, by implication, it teaches that we can know nothing. Our society not only lacks a common body of accepted knowledge, it lacks a commonly accepted method of acquiring knowledge on these subjects. Instead, various elements in society dismiss the questions with contempt, or maintain a benevolent neutrality, or invite us (silently) to form opinions based on the opinions of others, or on blind faith.
“But when we find ourselves habitually putting aside entire classes of phenomena that nonetheless continue to be reported over the years — over centuries — we ought to take that as a sign that we need to find or construct a better picture of the world we live in. Only an inadequate world-view forces us continually to ignore inconvenient data or put it into separate boxes that don’t communicate with the rest of our mental world or with each other.
“Among those inconvenient reports: ghosts; out-of-body experiences. Possession and witchcraft. Telepathy. UFOs. Afterlife experiences including heaven and hell. The power of prayer. The ability to heal by touch, and at a distance. Plenty more.
“To my mind, any way of seeing the world that has been believed over time by large numbers of people was not constructed out of whole cloth. It had at least a bit of reality. The trick is to keep the bit of reality and leave the logical structure that was constructed atop it. And the way to distinguish the two is to see which part can be reconciled with other parts. Truth, ultimately, is one. It’s a good sign that you’re on the right trail when many seemingly separate or even contradictory bits converge.â€Â