In an earlier blog I referred to the uniqueness of each human being; that our lives are the product of our experiences which no one else has duplicated or ever will duplicate exactly. This uniqueness is encoded in our DNA, according to Pim van Lommel M.D., the Dutch cardiologist/physicist, author of “Consciousness Beyond Life”. According to van Lommel, our DNA is roughly analogous to the bar codes listing the characteristics of items on supermarket shelves. But this is the subject of another later chapter
Next, in returning to the Conversations with God books written by Neale Donald Walsch, I’d like to discuss his explanation of the nature of our relationship with Divinity. As I understand it, our ever-evolving levels of consciousness, the product of successive generations of human existence, allow us to comprehend increasingly abstract concepts. This gift of Creation makes us, in a manner of speaking, junior partners with God.
The totality and the complexity of the nature of Divinity, admittedly, is beyond our comprehension and it’s probably safe to conclude it will be for eternity. But the growing expression of God’s thought and will is reflected in the unique lives of the whole of humanity. What are some of the connotations of this idea? Walsch’s professed contact with an aspect of Divinity through the automatic writing that formed the basis for his books, infers that the purpose of creating the billions of unique human beings now populating our planet, was to manifest God’s influence in all those lives in every manner conceivable.
But there is a conundrum implicit in explaining Divinity’s relationship with Creation’s human offspring. Since God does not have a biological existence, by inference God cannot experience the nature of God in human terms. But Jesus is reported to have said, “You are Gods”. There then, is the explanation. God has created basic replicas in human form in order to experience what life means in human terms. Presumably God is observing our agonizingly slow, fumbling spiritual development. Implicit in this relationship is free choice. We are free to choose our individual paths. As I mentioned earlier, we and circumstances have made arduous some of the paths we have chosen on our way to a spiritual existence.
I feel the need to make a detour here for the sake of complete openness. Desire is said to be a primary urge in human behavior. At my age in the mid 90’s, I obviously desire that my consciousness, that which is essentially me, will continue after my demise. Recognizing the relative inseparability between desire and belief, I must concede for the benefit of non-believers, that it is possible that my belief in the existence of an afterlife is heavily dependent on my realization that I will die in the next several years, present reasonably good health notwithstanding. I’ll have to leave it to my readers. Does what I have reported above resonate strongly enough with you to be able to disregard my possible personal prejudice?
I have touched on reincarnation in my previous blogs. I believe reincarnation is closely tied to our understanding of Divinity’s purpose for our lives. Now I would like to try to place reincarnation firmly in the cosmology of the universe in which we live. More than a few of the authors on my reading list have affirmed their belief in an afterlife and then, rebirth. This belief is a basic tenet in some Eastern religions. There are documented cases of young children urging their parents to take them to their former home (in a previous life) so that they can see, or even be reunited with their “real parents” or wife or husband. If the parents, worn down by their children’s constant pleas, attempt to comply with their children’s recollections and are sometimes successful, all sorts of problems are almost guaranteed to surface. The newly revealed “relatives” surprised by the unanticipated incursion and taken aback by a young child claiming to be a member of the family and calling the members of the household by name, or even more unsettling, insisting on being the spouse of one of the adults in the new household and obviously resenting the presence of a “usurper” wife or husband. The late Ian Stevenson, Professor Emeritus at the University of Virginia, travelled widely researching more than 2500 cases of claimed reincarnation during his long career. One of his publications titled “Children Who Remember Previous Lives” included encounters like the one mentioned above. Stevenson was strict in reporting only on cases that had third-party verification of details, usually by unrelated persons.
Once again, we can see what a blessing the total amnesia of almost all newly reincarnated souls can be. Not only do they begin a new life free of the baggage of former mistakes and bad habits as I mentioned earlier, but they also lose former attachments that might serve to limit opportunities otherwise open to them in their new lives. They are free to decide the path their lives will follow.
It is appropriate at this point to discuss the rationale for accepting reincarnation as factual. I mentioned earlier that our purpose for living our present existence is psychosocial evolution, the gaining of knowledge and then passing it on to future generations for their growth. I think we can agree by just observing the chaotic nature of the civilization we have created with its wars and with whole populations living with food insecurity, that while we may be technologically advanced, able to control a miniature helicopter in the Martian atmosphere with electronic signals from Earth, our moral state leaves something to be desired. As I suggested in my introductory blog, history shows our psychosocial advancement to be very slow, although grudgingly real; witness the status recently granted to women in the halls of Congress in the United States when a century ago they achieved the right to vote.
Statistics from polls reveal that a majority of U.S. residents give some credibility to reincarnation. Wishful thinking? Michael Newton PhD, a practicing psychotherapist for forty years based his entire book, “Journey of Souls”, that sold over 300,000 copies, on reports of his patients while under hypnosis, about their experiences in former lives. Neale Donald Walsch, whose “Conversations with God” books sold over a million copies in multiple languages, recorded that his discarnate correspondent, through automatic writing, called the psychosocial evolution of humankind a universal law. In book 1 he wrote, “Many of you will decide to come back here; to this world of density and relativity for another chance to experience out the decisions and choices you make about yourself —“.
Apparently, reincarnation is a personal choice. But psychosocial evolution is the assured future of humanity, so that we may become “Closer our God to Thee” (referring to the hymn I used to sing long ago as a child in Sunday School).
Proof Of An Afterlife 