Making A Fresh Start

Making a Fresh Start Summary This article deals with the current serious spiritual plight of humanity. The allusion to mankind’s spiritual degeneration has been made by every religious tradition of the world without exception. The remedy or cure is also enshrined in these ancient traditions. Unfortunately, this teaching has been misconstrued resulting in the loss of this ancient wisdom. Despite all our scientific and technological achievements the only way out for humanity is to rediscover this ancient door which opens out to spiritual liberation. While technology can serve us and take us to new heights, it can never liberate us from our stifling bondage. This article draws attention to this fact and encourages the reader to search for self liberation in a practical meaningful manner without being misled by manmade systems which seek to substitute themselves in place of the perennial path plotted by the diverse spiritual revelations granted to the different cultural traditions of the world showing mankind what has to be done to obtain healing and rejuvenation so as to be reintegrated with the true and real. Content Description The article begins with a reference to mankind’s spiritual depravity and argues for the urgent need to address this problem before anything else. The stress is laid on the need to accept this truth however bitter it is. It is also suggested that our cosmic isolation is also due to this factor and that a universal quarantine has been effectively in force as a result. The impotence of science and technology to pull us out of this predicament is considered and the attention of the reader drawn to the traditional religions which confront this problem directly and prescribe what has to be done. We have not been abandoned by the Creator. All cultures have received the invaluable spiritual prescription for curing this inherent human malady. The need for close cooperation with the Cosmic Forces as expressed through Divine Law and the importance of practice as opposed to mere intellectual assent or ecclesiastical compliance is highlighted. Complete resignation to the divine will is a prerequisite for spiritual progress.All expressions of Ego and aggressive self manifestation have to be overcome if one is to attune oneself to the cosmic process. We have to reject our old identity and accept the new identity that is offered to us. The article reveals that this latter is our true identity. It adverts to the fact that a pure heart is in a much better position to receive the revealed truths than a merely curious and brilliant brain and encourages readers to practice the religious method and discover for themselves the true power of religion which would enable them to blossom out to their optimum potential. We have successfully hidden from ourselves our inherent spiritual deformity. Man has been a fugitive running away from his true self and his creator. Time is running out and we must realize that we can’t be running forever.

Mankind Desperately Needs Help Making a Fresh Start We start from the premise that man is a spiritually sick being. This is the most basic and fundamental truth about ourselves, acknowledged by all religious traditions, although expressed in different ways, such as sin, ignorance, illusion and the like. All the traditions agree about this downgraded state of man and the need for spiritual upliftment. In this world of brilliant scientific achievement and technological success, we have to learn first to accept this unpalatable spiritual truth. Because of our degenerate spiritual status, we have become universal outcasts. We have no communion or communication with any other intelligent or spiritual life forms in the innumerable worlds of creation, and are virtually quarantined in a secluded corner of our own little universe. Even the remote frontiers of our own small material universe, let alone the innumerable worlds outside our range of perception, are beyond human access and understanding. Pretending that all is well with us because of our brilliant scientific achievements is only to fool ourselves. If we adopt that attitude, it would prevent us from seeking the help that we most urgently need. The human race, despite its alienation from the rest of creation, has not been completely abandoned or written off by its Creator or the Cosmic forces that brought it into existence. Help is given to mankind through the various religious traditions. The teachings enshrined in these traditions, reveal to man God’s life- giving Spirit. It is only the Spirit of God that can cure man of his inherent spiritual sickness, and infuse new life into him. Human science and technology, man’s most powerful tools hitherto discovered, are incapable of accomplishing his spiritual regeneration. When we are spiritually healed and regenerated, we shall be able to communicate with the rest of God’s creation. The overwhelming silence which now confronts and surrounds us, and in which we are so despairingly submerged, will be rent asunder, and our fellow beings in the universe will communicate with us. The human race will then no longer be isolated, and will be restored to its rightful place as a member of God’s family. What the powerful radio-telescopes of science fail to pick up, our purified hearts will receive, as the worlds rush in through newly unlocked doors, which had been closed behind us, in that ill-fated epoch, when our ancestors plunged the race into its present predicament. “ Fling wide the gates, open the ancient doors, and the great king will come in. Who is this great king? The triumphant Lord – he is the great king! ( Psalm 24: 9-10 Good News Bible)

In the spiritual healing process, we have to cooperate closely with the Divine Physician. We must surrender totally to the Spirit of God and allow His Grace to work in us. Self-will, self-action and even self-expression, which are no more than an expression of our bloated and distorted egos, have to be renounced. Our false ego must become less and less, so that our true Self can become more and more manifest. The enormity of our spiritual deformity, we have successfully hidden from ourselves. If we could only see through our self-deception, and even momentarily glimpse the spiritual leprosy ailing our souls, we will begin to realize why we are completely isolated in the universe. No clean spirit would approach us. No divine being would come near us. All the world’s sacred traditions focus emphasis on the urgent need to radically transform ourselves. We are repeatedly warned against mere routine conformity to external standards of conduct, be it religious ritual or ethical precept. Such superficial practices fail to effect the necessary spiritual cure. Let us not deceive ourselves or be misled by the counterfeit codes of conduct which seek to replace God’s spiritual law. Man made rules and regulations, be they secular or ecclesiastic, more often than not violate God’s spiritual law, and hence become a hindrance to spiritual development. Such rules and regulations may produce useful social animals and docile religious followers, but, they certainly don’t produce the higher type of human being envisaged by the best religious traditions of humanity. If man is to regain his rightful place in the order of creation, he must be spiritually cured and made whole again. This can only be accomplished by total submission to the omnipotent healing power as expressed by the different traditions in their own distinctive ways, and which alone can give mankind a new life, and lift up the race from the spiritual morass it is now bogged down in. Let us therefore categorically renounce the false and counterfeit man made sectarian codes of conduct which have for so long held us captive, and embark on a genuine spiritual journey, encouraged and strengthened by those pioneering spiritual giants of different traditions and cultures who truly practiced the sacred teachings embodied in their traditions, and proved to the world the truth and validity thereof.