Open Writing

There are two main obstacles to experiencing and embracing spiritualism as a way of life; a closed mind and the dogma of organised religion, especially the Church.

Personally I do not see why Christianity and spiritualism cannot co-exist in relative harmony, after all, many of their teachings and understandings have similarities. Both speak of spirit and an afterlife, both give the advice, "Ask and ye shall receive", both mention the ability to communicate with a higher awareness and one talks of reincarnation whilst the other believes in the ability to resurrect.

However, the Church has, through the ages, had a vested political and financial interest in maintaining the fallacy that an intermediary, such as itself, is required in order to access spirits in the afterlife. The Church has a history of unilaterally and hastily condemning any practise or belief which might prove a threat to its very existence. Spiritualism allows an individual personal access to divine guidance, thereby cutting out any need for the Church as a mediator and thus releasing the individual from being dependent on the religious institution itself. It is for this reason that the Church does not encourage or sanction spiritualism. Anything not sanctioned by the Church was, in the past, automatically and mistakenly labelled "evil".

The Church has, in times gone by, declared a similar war on science. The first split occurred when the Catholic Church labelled Galileo a heretic for announcing that it was the sun, and not the earth, which was at the centre of the solar system. A number of biblical passages clashed with Galileo's findings and he thereby called the teachings of the Church into question, threatening to rock its very foundations. Even today, we see this condemning of science as heretical when the doctrine of the Church dismisses and repudiates the theory of Intelligent Design. The Theory of Evolution threatens to subvert the Church's teachings of creation. Is this an echo of the Galileon past when science proved the Church to be teaching outdated religious dogma? Why can't we learn from quantum theory and accept that both forms could possibly have merit? Is it possible that they could co-exist? Is it not conceivable that the building blocks of life, which enabled our evolution, were initially created?

Why does there have to be a clash between belief in a deity, spiritualism and science? Are they not all parts of the same holistic, deeply interconnected reality, all threads woven and vibrating on the same string?

Isn't religion merely an outward manifestation of our awareness of an inner spirituality and a way of formalising our universal need to explain the existence of a higher intelligence behind what we see? Religion and spiritualism are both signs that an individual is on a spiritual quest as opposed to being agnostic and in denial of the soul's continued existence.

The same goes for science and spiritualism. For a spiritual person there is no greater perception of, and proximity to, a divine presence than when they witness and experience nature and its wonders and intricate workings for themselves. What is there, other than the doctrines of the Church, to stop us from being a natural spiritualist or spiritually natural?

Perhaps by being so rigid in our thinking and categorisations we are preventing ourselves from finding the fundamental truth - that there is one, universal afterlife for all souls, regardless of colour, culture or creed.

It is mankind himself, and mankind alone, who has put in place the barriers of exclusivity which divide us here on earth. Most of us erroneously view ourselves as individual humans on a spiritual journey when we are, in actuality, homogenous spirits on a human journey.

Personally, I no longer have a need for organised religion in my life. It never was a comfortable fit for me anyway, nor did it ever give me undeniable evidence of an afterlife. I have become far wiser, stronger and more joyful by exploring the truth on my own and I now KNOW that there is an afterlife. How can I be so certain? Well, it communicates with me from time to time, in a comforting, irrefutable manner.

Ultimately, all that matters is those whom you hold dear in your heart and those who hold you in theirs, even through to the next life, across the divide of space and time. In this way the opposite of death is not life, but love, a pulsating, binding love which means that you are never truly separated from those you care about.

All I ask of you is that you don't close your mind to the wonders and possibilities of spirituality and spiritualism and definitely don't let some institution do it on your behalf. You might be surprised what you discover.

Don't denigrate its importance to your own detriment. Sometimes what you don't believe can be equally restricting as what you categorically do believe.

Lend me your mind and maybe, just maybe I'll show you the way back to your soul.