The Great Commission and the Divine Light (Father James)

Father James is a character from the novel 2077: Knights of Peace

¹⁶ Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. ¹⁷ When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. ¹⁸ Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹ Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Matthew 28:16-20

The submission to Christ of the world’s religions and denominations, which we now realize had been proceeding intermittently through the post-Renaissance centuries and before, sometimes quietly, sometimes noisily, became peacefully explicit and global in the months and years following my epiphany, the break up of Baroqo and the end of my non-belief. The world’s mystics, prophets and leaders of all faiths in all nations received similar epiphanies over the subsequent decades

That this was the work of some heavenly agency was apparent to all the religious leaders and there was at the top level no resentment among even the non-Christian religions, the ones who had received epiphanies or been close to those who had. It was to them clearly the work of the loving God through the power of the Holy Spirit. Yet to the bulk of the Moslems, Jews, Hindus and Buddhists, being more remote from  the divine aurora which had descended on humanity, there were still vestiges of resentment and confusion as the rituals, liturgies and cultures of the non-Christian belief systems adjusted  to the reality of a single loving God explicitly and unmistakably incarnate in humankind. 

It was therefore decided by the ecumenical leaders that this healing manifestation of the third member of the Holy Trinity – that is, the Holy Spirit – be called the Divine Light and that the human institution for dispensing and distributing the healing of humanity be called the Monastery of Divine Light rather than the Monastery of the Holy Spirit. The monks, both Christian and Buddhist,  were renamed Hermit Sages. Although for the Christians this also demanded some adjustment it was of course a less difficult one. 

The MDL has indeed been successful, with monasteries in Shanghai and on Mars. There is still progress to be made but God must be rejoicing in the fruits of the suffering endured two thousand years ago while incarnate in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Lord forgive us if we have offended in any way against the Holy Spirit by naming this particular manifestation of it the Divine Light.

Click  here for the cumulative writings of Father James.

The deep mystery of existence.3. Evolution equals design

A common human weakness is to engage in utterly futile arguments. 

Looking at the fossil record gathered since the 18^th century and accepting the widespread interpretation of this by biologists and zoologists, it certainly looks as though life in its present state has evolved. St Augustine of Hippo (354-430 AD), commonly acknowledged as the greatest Christian theologian and philosopher, proposed that ‘In the beginning were created only germs or causes of the forms of life which were afterwards to be developed in gradual course.’  (from Genesi ad Litteram, the Literal meaning of Genesis). This preceded Darwin by some 1400 years. 

 What many modern life science academics seem unable to admit, in the face of overwhelming evidence, is that this evolution, like that of the entire universe which preceded it, has been entirely purposeful, as though working towards some end point, and that modern physics and biology increasingly point to the whole universe being a kind of mind. 

Equally puzzling are the young earth creationists who seem afraid of evolution, despite its proposal from the 4^th century.  Fundamentalist creationism became significant, though not dominant, around the time of the Reformation (c.1500AD) and stems, in my view, from a failure to look deeply at the meaning of Genesis within the Hebrew culture at the time of the God-inspired writing and redaction of the Pentateuch. See also The fittest survive: but how? 

 (We Christians differ in theology, eschatology and hermeneutics but share a belief in the bodily Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ and His saving by grace of all humankind from the consequences of sin here and in the state of eternal life, which starts now, in this life, and survives physical death.)

In our limited reality time obviously figures to the extent that the biological world is synchronised. It is becoming increasingly evident that events in the living world previously thought to be unconnected are in fact orchestrated and coordinated not only with each other but with the geological, oceanographic, atmospheric and astronomical arenas in which they occur. How else could the biosphere function over hundreds of millions of years as solar radiation grew by over 20%?  It is not too much of a conjecture to imagine the whole universe, including the history of civilisation, as being synchronised to some cosmic master clock. If this were the case there would indeed be a basis for assuming some relationship between celestial patterns of events and the events on earth. However, it is my strong belief that prediction of events in human affairs and the living world, other than under controlled experimental conditions, is not possible for mortal beings since this would remove free will and I take it as self evident that our Creator has endowed us with this.

Exploration and movement towards a goal seems to be a characteristic of humanity as a species. If we are made in God’s image (Genesis 1: 24) could this mean that in addition to being loving, truthful, just, merciful and creative, God is constantly seeking the fulfillment of a purpose? Yet if God merely set the whole process of physical and spiritual evolution in progress over the ages and left it to unfold how could He (I stick to the male pronoun for tidiness knowing that the essence of God is both male and female, something personal but beyond gender classification)  be interactively involved with it?  How could He respond to our free will decisions to submit to His will or reject it?

To get any kind of feel for this we have to try to imagine a God’s eye view.    In trying to imagine it we get a sense of a personal omnipotent entity beyond imagining.

To God, existing transcendentally beyond and within our parochial little universe (big only in space-time extent, but tiny compared to the fullness of God), human and cosmic history existed as a single tapestry or picture in His mind.  He chose a tapestry of perfection which could be woven through history by freely acting humans.  He knew how each person would freely act in every circumstance and chose an end time world which would be perfect yet compatible with these free decisions in the long term.

 From our perspective it seems as though time is passing, nature is evolving and human history is unfolding. God is seated outside of time, in eternity: all events - past, present and future from our perspective- appear on one cosmic tapestry or painting.  In some unfathomable way our free will decisions, made before God created our space-time-energy universe as a kind of cosmic stage on which humanity and individuals play their part,  interact with the process of creating the Holy tapestry as God works towards perfection, a new heaven and a new earth, an end point which the Creator has in mind. In this model scientists are actors on the stage diverting their attention from the drama of earthly life to investigate the construction and operation of the stage scenery and machinery.

Our pre-creation counterparts make free decisions on whether to submit to God’s will. When we  make a decision  it is a manifestation of a decision made outside our space-time-energy existence. When, in this transcendent, ephemeral  existence we voluntarily submit to God’s will the tapestry develops towards perfection smoothly and without evil consequences. When there is sin the tapestry is blemished and bad things happen (e.g. war, disease, social breakdown, these consequences affecting even the innocent while in their mortal state prior to eternal life). The heavenly existence which survives physical death is threatened or diminished in some way. Imagine God as painting a masterwork and having his arm jolted every time a sin occurs.

So the process of biological evolution is that of God weaving and refining the natural world (only a tiny part of a much richer and unimaginable reality), a process of ongoing design outside of space-time that we perceive as a flux of evolutionary events in our world of clocks, rulers and scientific instruments. Even some random events could be part of God's work, perhaps small chaotic patterns of dots within the 'painting', needed to make it complete and right in God's eye.

 Any attempt by me to understand God's scheme and purpose is doomed to failure but our Creator has designed us to make such attempts. (Also,  He has a sense of humour and is infinitely forgiving.) It just helps me make sense of the all surpassing mystery of reality and it could conceivably help others, even if it means spurring them towards some other notion. It is in this spirit, and the hope that it will do something to help end this destructive and supremely silly conflict between neo-Darwinists with faith in chance and young earth creationists forced to put God into a box by the reductionists who have come to dominate western thought,  that I present it. Christie elision (Christ have mercy).

See also
Our perception of reality, ancient and modern

 John,  cosmik.jo@gmail.com

Author 2077: Knights of Peace

Our precious planet. Part 3. Built for civilization

Part 1 showed how the solar system is situated in a safe haven in the cosmos. Part 2  listed the factors which make the Earth itself unique for the development of life. 

This post deals with the special terrestrial conditions which allowed civilization to evolve.

Here they are, as far as I understand them:

Atmosphere

The oxygen content of the atmosphere is just right to allow fire (any more and all combustible material would  be ablaze, much less and we would not be able to breath). Fire has been an essential requirement for keeping warm as well as ore smelting, metal processing, cooking, medicine, heat engines, rocket motors and much else.

Approximately 4/5 of the atmosphere is nitrogen and this has been a major contributor to soil fertility. (See below.)

The atmosphere is relatively clear so that we can see celestial objects and deduce our place in the larger scheme of things. (See below.)

 Water

The different phases of water depend on the pressure exerted on them by the atmosphere and on the ambient temperature. On the Earth's surface  the pressure and the range of temperatures allows all three phases of water: solid, liquid and vapour. These conditions have existed for billions of years and allowed the development of biodiversity (e.g. by transporting pollen, viruses and bacteria around the globe in oceans and cloud aerosols).

Rivers, lakes and oceans have allowed exploration and  trade in bulk up to very large distances. They have also been a valuable source of fish, a staple food for most peoples and in combination with the atmosphere have kept the climate stable enough to permit
the  building and survival of cities. 

Largely through the Earth's unique  plate tectonics and crustal formation mechanism it has the right ratio of land to sea area (29%). The topography, the relative sizes of the continental land masses and the positioning of continents and  islands are also optimal. E.g. diverse societies evolve because they are separated and yet are still able to trade and interact, which usually leads to innovation and enrichment. 

 Soil                 

The surface soil in combination with a plethora of micro organisms have been suitable for agriculture, the main facilitator of civilization through human history. Lightning has been a crucial factor in extracting nitrogen from the atmosphere - nitrogen being a critically important nutrient for crops and other plants. Lightning also starts wildfires, leaving mineral-rich charcoal which improves the soil's ability to retain water. The origin of soil is complex but associated with rivers, flooding, rainfall and glaciation as well as earth movements and volcanoes due to plate tectonics.

Animals

 Animals suitable for breeding, training and domestication (e.g. dogs, sheep, goats, oxen, horses, falcons) have been essential in allowing hunting, agriculture, transport and communication to develop. Even if animals had evolved on other planets they are unlikely to include these or even their equivalents. Dogs, e.g., have  unique DNA which permits extraordinary variability through breeding.

Location in the Milky Way Galaxy (MWG)

Our solar system, unlike most star systems, is so placed in the MWG as to afford good views of the universe. It also enables us to measure the cosmic microwave background (‘snow’ on the screens of certain TVs) from the nascent universe, providing evidence of the Big Bang theory. Had the Sun been placed in most parts of our Galaxy we would be totally oblivious to most of the universe and its history (in a sense we still are because it comprises largely dark matter and energy; but at least we are aware that there is something there waiting to be investigated). 

Order in the sky

 The ordered movements of the Sun, Moon, planets and stars in the sky, from night to night, day to day, a consequence of the Earth’s rare stable rotation, inspired the ancients to develop mathematics and mark the seasons for agriculture. The concept of an ordered universe was born. Largely unpredictable events such as exploding stars (supernovae), meteors and comets only served to emphasize the underlying order.

Also, the Moon is 400 x smaller than the Sun but 400 x nearer. This makes them appear to be the same size in the sky and results  in the extraordinary phenomenon of total eclipses which excited the curiosity of early man; and without curiosity, civilization can't develop.

 The resulting solar eclipses enabled modern man to learn about the Sun’s atmosphere and discover helium in the Sun before it was found on Earth .The identical apparent sizes of the Sun and Moon also allowed precisely timed eclipses and new moons to form the basis of a calender.

Ice cores, sediments and fossils

 Freezing of ice over millions of years has provided ice cores giving evidence for solar, supernovae, magnetic, atmospheric, volcanic and pollen phenomena over this period. Cores of lake sediments have also proved valuable records of the past, especially climate change. This evidence would not have been available without water occurring as both liquid and ice for billions of years. No other planet we know allows this. Understanding of history is important in allowing a people to advance.

Fossils of creatures preserved in sea deposits turned to rock have given us the ability to reconstruct certain aspects of the evolution of life over billions of years.

Materials courtesy of plate tectonics and the moon

Ores and minerals –e.g. copper, tin , iron, uranium and silicon - for materials technology have been made available through fine tuned plate tectonics. Hence the Bronze, Iron, Atomic and Silicon Ages (what next?). Note that plate tectonics, as far as we know unique to Earth,  are driven by the heat released during the decay of radioactive thorium and uranium produced in stars.

 A few months ago a paper in Nature showed that the formation of the Moon has played a critical role in preventing the 'iron-loving' heavy  elements (gold, silver, iron, titanium and others) needed for civilisation  from migrating  towards the Earth's core which would make them unavailable for mining. See this article by Hugh Ross. 

Energy

Vegetation and fauna for coal, natural gas and oil was deposited in time for use by technology-driven peoples. Even today areas once devoted to crops are being used for biofuel plants. 

The existence of hills and mountains, again the result of plate tectonics, together with water, results in fast flowing rivers and water falls which served as power sources alongside oxen etc. in pre-modern civilizations. Tidal and wave power is also used.

Nuclear fission has been a major carbon-free energy source since the 1960s and, like plate tectonics, depends on radioactive atoms made in stars. This form of nuclear power is likely to be replaced by nuclear fusion later this century. This is a much cleaner and should involve minimal environmental damage. In my novel (2077: Knights of Peace), this is the  main power source for the world at that time (although very much a background to the main theme of fighting violence without causing more violence). Certain types of nuclear fusion technology look promising as power sources for interplanetary missions.

 Conclusion

These conditions, and probably many others, were key to the development of our civilization. No other planet discovered so far appears to have life; or, if it does, it has not evolved beyond bacteria or viruses, even over billions of years. Whatever the implications there is no doubt that humankind and the world it inhabits are in a class apart from the rest of creation.

John

Author, 2077: Knights of Peace

Reach me at
cosmik.jo@gmail.com


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Links to all 4 parts of Our Precious Planet and related links can be found here
 including Pt 4 on the timing of civilization