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Word Gems
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what is the ‘good news’ for humanity
As a young person I would hear traditional religion speak of its central tenet, the ‘gospel’ or the ‘good news.’ It seemed strange to me, however, that, given the preeminence of this doctrine, no one could give me a short and clear answer as to exactly what this ‘good news’ might be; at least, not in terms of anything that sounded like something anybody’d really want.
Most of the standard definitions of ‘good news’ had to do with the church, and its present leadership, ruling over everybody ‘with a rod of iron’ in some future cosmic setting. Well, we could hardly wait. We take note that in the ‘500 tape-recorded messages from the other side,” a Brother John of Glastonbury, a former monk during his earth-life, explicitly asserts that the coming future world will not be an “extension” of the church’s domain.
But what is the ‘good news’ for humanity? I think we can answer this by looking at humankind’s consummate ‘bad news’, our most dreaded nightmare. And what is that? The great psychologists inform us: It's what we constantly repress. It's the fear of death, the unspoken terror of annihilation, which is the hidden motivator of so much of the unenlightened mind’s activity.
The ‘good news’, in its most fundamental element, is that there is no death. No one dies. No one has ever died. It’s not possible to die. Moreover, for those who choose it, individual progress and advancement is eternal; happiness, for those who seek it, is eternal. This Earth-world has been a stage of loss and disaster for everyone, but this deficit is illusion.
All good things, that for which the battered heart yearns, will yet become reality in our home-world, Summerland. All this, truly, begins to sound like good news.
Postscript:
‘instructed by dread’
Some will say, “I don’t fear death, I never think about it, when it comes it comes.” But the great psychologists elucidate: we repress and mask the fear of death to cope with it.
However, there is an aspect of the fear of death, in another guise, much closer to surface awareness, which plagues virtually everyone. It is the fear of never finding happiness.
Kierkegaard famously spoke of this: “instructed by dread.” Most of us instinctively run away from, distract ourselves, when confronted by the fear of never finding happiness. Instead, we are to face it openly, not repress. When we do, we will find inner whisperings leading us to a new reality. See the Krishnamurti lectures.
Its whispering message is this: We shall find happiness. Every desire, every psychological prompting, will yet be satisfied. A new world is coming wherein we might explore every good thing – every yearning and longing, every passion and aspiration. We will yet be made whole.
There is no death, and there is no failure to achieve happiness. This is the real good news.
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Frederic W. H. Myers, in the afterlife, transmitted to Juliet S. Goodenow, Vanishing Night: “You [shall] find whatever you search after. In all the category of experience, you gain what you are searching after — in literature, in art, knowledge, science, invention, love-attainment, in culture, wisdom, riches or treasure… All is accorded you. The spiritual embodiment of your life work is your treasure in Heaven, those laid up by yourself [that is, what you have made of yourself, reflecting your particular talents], your treasures, your mansion, your reward for all you have done on the Earth Plane is laid up by yourself, for yourself, when at last you attain your reward for deeds done in the body. No arbitrary avenging angel awaits you. Creation afforded you in the beginning the implements of industrious labor to satisfy the craving of hunger of the body, and for the satisfaction of the soul. Within your complex organism the Creator placed a guide [that is, your particular desire and sentiment, which reveal destiny] — your passport through the world and through eternity.”
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