TODAY'S CONSIDERATIONS
ANNOUNCEMENTS
1. I had to reschedule the two pending post-cataract-surgery corrective procedures until October 26th, so postings may continue to happen somewhat sporadically.
2. [See the offer following this post for details on how you can watch a retreat on video which includes a detailed discussion of all seven of the steps on the path as used by Maharaj]
3. Here, with those who are still driven to talk about "God," the "Son of God," the "Holy Spirit," "Buddha," "Krishna," etc., etc., etc., the invitation to them is to view those as verbs, not nouns. See the end of the post for the full meaning and implications of that.
4. A new video ("Number Ten: Awakening Together Satsang, March 2018") has now been added in the far right column of this page, offering the opportunity to view a recent 2018 satsang session with Floyd being interviewed by Regina and Jacqueline of "The Awakening Together Group."
THE SEEDS OF DUALITY WHICH PRODUCE DUALITY'S PROGENY:
Offspring Number Eight-
A Fanatical Desire Among the Non-Realized Masses to Spread their Beliefs in Separation, Different-From-Ment, and Better-Than-Ment
The concept of "apart-from" rather than "apart-of" of has long been the preference among the masses when it comes to persons' tribes, race, sexual persuasion, cultural "values," and - in humankind's more recent history - politics and religion.
While working in the state of Louisiana, I was introduced to a woman who had recently relocated there from Utah. She said that she "had been abused by her Mormon husband for years" and that "the leaders in the Mormon Church told me repeatedly to submit to his will (which was surely also God's Will) for both of us."
When she began to talk more about her former religion, she said that she had been raised in the Church by Mormon parents and that she had been taught as a child that they founder Joseph Smith had explained to the members of the Church that they could expect to be attacked for their beliefs and that he wanted them to be very clear that to preserve the church, "they were entitled to lie and cheat and steal and kill if they decided it was necessary to protect themselves and to preserve the religion."
Yet that was not a new belief. Lying and cheating and stealing and killing has been as much a part of humanity's religions as it has been a part of humanity's way of doing business and running their politics.
For example, there was more than one "Inquisition," and the earliest, at the start of the 13th century, wasn’t in Spain. The various inquisitions lasted roughly 700 years from 1231 A.D. until the 19th century and estimates of the number killed by the Catholic Church range from the tens of thousands to numbers in the millions if the entire 700 years are taken into account.
There was some overlapping with the Christian vs. Muslim Crusades which began in 1095 and ended in 1291. Again, the exact number of people who died in the Crusades is not known but it is estimated that as many as 1.7 million people were killed during the entire series of nine religious wars,
From the early 1500's to the mid-1600's, over 10,000,000 people were killed in Europe's Catholic vs. Protestant religious wars.
Early on, the Jews - claiming to be "God's Chosen People" - claimed that they were being persecuted by members of other tribes who worshipped a different God from the God of Abraham.
Later, they would claim they were being persecuted by Christians (with Lutherans and Catholics killing 6 million of them during the Holocaust in Germany when 12 million persons were killed by the Nazis and nearly 80 million people died in WWII before the Nazis were defeated). Note that the Christians also worshipped the God of Abraham.
From the early 1500's until the present Jews felt they were being persecuted by Christians and the Jews and Christians felt they were being persecuted by the Muslims (who also worshipped the God of Abraham) and the Muslims felt they were being persecuted by the Jews and Christians though all were supposedly worshipping the same God.
Add in the 150,000,000 "spiritual but non-religious indigenous people" who were killed by invaders of "The New World" who were mostly self-identified as "Christians" and the number of people killed in six or so centuries as a result of religion-inspired, non-dual beliefs in separation, different-from-ment, and better-than-ment would boggle the senses.
Nowadays, since the 11 September 2001 attacks, the anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. has grown to the point that the current Christian-Evangelical-supported administration his openly declared its animosity toward Muslims, aggravating the decades-long sentiment among Christians in the U.S. that non-Christians have been attacking them.
That Christian view became especially commonplace in the 1940's when "the Religious Right" movement found its roots in American politics and has grown to be especially influential since the 1970s. Nowadays, they are one of the most powerful religious / political forces in the U.S.
Today, fanaticism is their stock in trade, but that too in nothing new. One historian defined Christian terrorism as "terrorist acts by groups or individuals who profess Christian motivations or goals." (Echoes of Joseph Smith, yes?)
The 1609 Gunpowder Plot in the U.K. was planned by Christian terrorists.
The Ku Klux Klan has always been a Christian terrorist organization which has long touted their Christian principles even as they have been killing blacks since the mid-1800's.
Presently in the U.S., there are 926 mostly-Christian religious groups who are advocating hate and racism and white supremacy and murder. Among their numbers are those self-identifying as "the alt-right," an ultra-conservative group which is described as "a weird mix of old-school neo-Nazis, conspiracy theorists, anti-globalists, and young right-wing internet trolls—all united in the belief that white male identity is under attack by multicultural, 'politically correct' forces."
During the last national election in the U.S., they voted from the most non-politically correct candidate / candidates they could find, and as vocal as they have become on the national stage, it was not difficult for many first-time voters to find them. The same trend is unfolding in Western Europe and in many other places around the globe. Why?
Because the Ultimate Sickness has spread to so many places around the globe, driving the non-realized masses to spread their beliefs about separation, different-from-ment, better-than-ment, and their sense of supremacy, all of which foster and support the same kind of historical suspicion and blaming and hatred and killing described above.
Thirteen years ago, one of the types that Maharaj warned seekers to avoid - namely, the Big Name Teachers - inspired many "seekers" to conclude that a major turning point had been reached on the planet and that a major shift was happening around the globe and that people will finally be able to achieve worldwide peace and harmony as the people of earth were finally "coming to the end of all mythologies, ideologies, and belief systems." Really?
Just as Maharaj did during the later days of his teaching, I called "Bullshit!" on that kind of nonsense, but tens of millions bought into that newest version of "a miraculous, spirituality-based snake-oil" that was being sold.
Well, look around now, only a little more than a decade later, and see what is really happening on the planet:
The non-dual understanding is not driving either business leaders or religious leaders or political leaders and is not influencing their millions and billions of followers. A global awakening has not manifested, and Maharaj knew that it never would.
He said at one point that "only in ten million will ever 'get' this message" which he was offering; later, he revised that to say that "only one in one million will ever 'get' this message" which he was offering; and even later he said that "only in one hundred thousand will ever 'get' this message" which he was offering. Will 7.6 billion persons on the planet, those numbers will never lead to a global awakening or to a new earth.
As for you, only one in one need "get it" if you would be free of being driven by the duality-based beliefs in separation, different-from-ment, and better-than-ment and if you would be free of the chaos and conflict and hatred which those beliefs engender by way of politically-rooted differences and religiously-rooted differences and, yes, even spiritually-rooted differences.
To be continued.
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Here, with those who are still driven to talk about "God," the "Son of God," the "Holy Spirit," "Buddha," "Krishna," etc., etc., etc., the invitation to them is to view those as verbs, not nouns.
THE EXPLANATION
If looked at as nouns, they point to illusions and are, therefore, a total waste of time to even discuss; if looked at as verbs which are resulting in certain sane but rare behaviors among humanity, then they are worthy of some attention during the relative existence.
Meaning? There are members of certain groups who say things such as "My concept of God in the past was of a weak God, an absentee God, A Santa Claus-type God, a mean, punishing, vindictive God, etc. Today, I am in close contact with a loving and caring God whom I worship and praise and glorify and give thanks to."
The reply to that usually goes like this: "If you are in contact with a God that wants to be worshipped and praised and glorified, then you're dealing with someone like yourself - a narcissist - and hanging out with narcissists will never bring an end to your narcissism (that narcissism evidenced by the fact that you think you are "godly").
Next, in the phrase 'loving and caring God,' any supposed God that truly had her or his act together would tell you that the totally irrelevant part of that phrase is 'God' and that the only part that is relevant is the "loving and caring" part.
"That is, a non-narcissistic god / goddess would say, "I care not an iota about being worshipped and praised and glorified by you or anyone else. How arrogant and insecure and needy would I have to be to want that? Forget the man-made, dreamed up noun 'God' and focus on the 'God as a verb' understanding and then go forth and let loving and caring be verbs - not adjectives - and let them generate the act of love and the act of caring and let those actions manifest through you."
Yeshu'a (Jesus) and Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis were spot on:
"No one shall ever see 'the kingdom of heaven.' It is within"
--Yeshu'a (Jesus)
and
"Heaven and earth shall fade away."
--Yeshu'a (Jesus)
and
"Heaven and hell are not geographic places but are states of mind, nothing more than concepts dreamed up by men."
--Pope John Paul II
"There is no hell."
--Pope Francis,
the current pope
in an interview
with journalist Eugenio Scalfari,
a writer
used by the Pope to issue off the record
teachings
which become a part of the Papal Magisterium.
[That said, would that the popes who have shown the courage to reject a core concept of their dogma - namely, "hell" - would find the additional courage required to question the very existence of their institution in light of the centuries-long cover-up of their history of raping children and in light of the mental and emotional and psychological scarring of billions of their members past and present.
And that need for courage also applies as questions need to be asked about why so many other sky cults are still being supported and allowed to continue to exist as well. When certain types of programming and conditioning have been shown to blind the masses, they should end. Will they? Not likely. Why?
Because what the masses think and say and do is most influenced by the international crime families which hold sway over the masses as criminals conduct their planet-wide operations. What are the major international crime families and which are the most influential and have the largest memberships?
The Mafia / La Cosa Nostra; the Catholic Church (with it 1.2 billion followers); Protestant and Evangelical Churches (with over 1.2 billion followers) like the one I was raised in where the youth director molested and sexually assaulted young girls; big business which has long created environments in which people have been abused; powerful political bodies like the U.S. Congress, etc., etc., etc.)
With all of those crime families, neither the followers nor the leadership ever voluntarily step down or shut down their criminal activities. Be they gangs, organized crime families, religions, big business, politicians, etc., they all want control and they all want power and they all want money, and nothing internal will interfere with the driving forces at play.
The masses must demand that all those in charge must step down and their groups and institutions must shut down, and there's the real problem because the continuation of their crimes are enabled not as much by the people running such crime organizations as they are enabled by the masses of people who - wanting some perceived "payoff" - remain involved with them and give them money and support them and aid and abet the continued existence of those criminal enterprises and thus facilitate the ability of church criminals and political criminals and other types of criminals to continue to commit their crimes.]
Here's
the direct link to the VIDEO VERSION
of the "Awakening Together" satsang session with Regina and Jacqueline referenced earlier, 18 MARCH 2018
If preferred, here's
the direct link to the AUDIO VERSION
of that session.
