Posted on 26 September 2022, 10:51

According to a recent survey (World Values Survey 2017-2022), only 41.7 percent of the population in the United Kingdom believes in life after death.  Thus, while watching the funeral service of Queen Elizabeth II on television on September 19, I wondered what the other 58.3 percent of those in attendance were thinking when various Church of England clergy and officials continually said or suggested that the queen is now “in Heaven,” or words to that effect. At the same time, I could visualize a number of militant nihilists around the world scoffing, sneering, and snorting in self-righteous disdain. 

Yes, there were many foreign dignitaries at the funeral and the percentages are a little higher for some of them, e.g., 56.9 percent for Canada, 53.8 percent for Australia, and 68.2 percent for the United States, but overall, assuming the survey is valid, it seems fair to accept that at least half of those in attendance considered themselves nihilists.  While listening to the Church authorities, I tried to subrogate myself to the minds of the nihilist and analyze my reaction to the words delivered as well as to the entire spiritual atmosphere surrounding me.  Rather than see myself as an absolute nihilist, closedmindedly 100 percent locked into that belief system, I chose to be a 90 percent nihilist, meaning that 10 percent of my view was still clinging to the religious “fairy tale” my mother and others brainwashed me with during those formative years.  I considered myself too smart and scientifically minded to hold on to those fairy tales, but that 10 percent helped me avoid complete existential angst when the usual escape mechanisms failed me.

Emotionally moved by the pomp, solemnity, and grandeur of the spectacular service, I found myself drifting from that 90 percent nihilistic worldview to close to 50 percent, while asking myself if it is possible that I have made a too hasty conclusion in dismissing it all as unscientific nonsense. Emotions were doing battle with my intellect.  I breathed a sigh of relief with the thought that a number of like-minded secularists – a more acceptable name than nihilists – sitting around me could not read my mind and know of my absurd thoughts. It was about then that the younger generation of royalty came within my view and, considering that the other surveys reveal that people from their generation are even more nihilistic than older ones, I wondered if they really believed the Church propaganda or if they were simply “playing the game,” so to speak, out of respect for their elders and for the sake of tradition.

As Church authorities spoke, mentioning the seemingly monotonous orthodox Heaven, the far-off Judgment Day, the so-called “sleep” until that day, the atonement doctrine, and other dreary ideas adopted by the Church of England, my belief meter worked its way back to 90 percent disbelief, maybe even touching 100 percent, and I struggled to resist the existential angst that was beginning to grip me.  “No, the queen is extinct, and so are my deceased loved ones,” I admonished myself.  “Their personalities are completely obliterated just as mine will be some day. But I won’t know it, so why concern myself with it.”

My intellect would not allow the heart-rending magnificence of all that surrounded me to triumph over reason. I was steadfast in my nihilistic worldview by the time the service ended. I would not succumb to religious propaganda, but I reasoned that it was best to hold on to that 10 percent belief factor to protect myself from future attacks of existential angst. Outwardly, however, I would pretend to be at 100 percent so as not to shame myself, even though 100 percent is a very unscientific approach and should shame me. 

The media reports after the funeral lent themselves to the nihilistic view, never distinguishing between the queen’s mortal remains and her persona.  One commentator said something to the effect that “the body of Queen Elizabeth will be laid with her husband Philip in the Windsor chapel where they will be together for eternity.”  What a dismal and depressing picture that offers. 

Back to not imagining, I thought about the comment made by Professor Augustus De Morgan, the renowned British mathematician and logician, in his letter to his mother, when he said, in effect, that if he were to return to an organized religion, he would choose the “Church of Rome” over the Church of England. (See blog of September 13, 2022).  He didn’t give a specific reason beyond saying the Church of Rome provided much more knowledge than the Church of England, but I suspect that idea of Purgatory was one of the major reasons for that comment. 

The Protestant Reformation attempted to do away with Purgatory – sort of a middle ground between heaven and hell, one in which souls would purge themselves of their sins before being allowed entrance to Heaven. The Protestant afterlife supposed souls were all good or all evil.  There were no shades of gray between the ultimate good and the ultimate evil.  It held that a person was “saved” as long as he made the right choice in selecting and worshipping his savior during his or her lifetime.  Luck was often a very big factor in finding that savior.  The unlucky one was condemned to eternity in everlasting fire. Is it any wonder that rational people abandoned organized religions?

And while Catholics offered a middle ground, it was as bad as hell except that it did not last for eternity.  Indications are that the Catholic Church now avoids any discussion of purgatory as even the person who departs the earth life with a soul a very light shade of gray has reason to fear death and what is ahead. 

Neither the Protestants nor the Catholics seem to have given any consideration to the revelations that began with Emanual Swedenborg during the middle of the eighteenth century suggesting that there are many realms or levels of consciousness in the afterlife environment, or as it is translated in the New Testament, “many mansions in my Father’s house.” 

While words of the discarnate Albert Pauchard (1878-1934) are not subject to scientific confirmation, they are consistent with many other messages coming from the Other Side relative to life on that side of the veil.  “Purgatory is not a fancy, it is a reality,” Pauchard communicated to his sister Antoinette through a medium shortly after his death, at age 56. He went on to explain that it was not a place of punishment for faults committed, but rather a place one has created for him- or herself based on the person’s mindset and earthly deeds. (Reference: The Other World, available at White Crow Books)

“One meets all kinds of people here,” Pauchard continued. “One sees everybody as they really are, and each individual spends a more or less long period in his or her own particular Purgatory. You will be the first to understand how intensely one desire to warn those on earth when seeing all this.  Because a little goodwill, the slightest effort, even without success, makes such an enormous difference in the results over here.”  He added that he lives in a four-dimensional world which is constituted of more living realities than on the material plane.  “The intensity of joy and moral suffering is multiplied more than a hundredfold, and impressions which on earth are more or less vague take an objective and symbolic form here…”

Pauchard communicated that many people there do not understand their condition.  A typical case, he explained, was that of a man who prided himself on being an intellectual.  “A materialist of course,” he continued. “You know their theories. As a consequence of their belief that after death there is no consciousness, many of these people go to sleep for a more or less long period.”  Pauchard referred to him as an “honourable” type and a theoretician.  “He continues theorizing here.  He is not even aware that physical wants and conditions have vanished.  They had never meant much to him.  He sees around him his study and bedroom and simply goes on in the old way as he did not earth. As to his Purgatory, he has not yet gone through it.  There is still room for it in his being. His incessant and rather superficial intellectual activity must first wear out a little.  Only people who have a heart and imagination pass through their Purgatory at an early stage. While those who deny life after death and are endowed with a great imagination go to sleep.  That is part of their Purgatory, for they are conscious of the only thing they had always dreamt of: their unconsciousness.”

Pauchard added that neither he nor any other soul there could make the man understand his condition. His current activity must “wear out” on its own. “In the end, he will grow tired of it, and in that way begin his Purgatory.  In a case like this, Purgatory does not take an objective, symbolic form, for the individual has no imagination.” 

Another difficult case, Pauchard told his sister, was that of a clergyman who, not having found the conditions he expected, does not believe in his own death. “He is troubled by things he cannot explain and believes himself to have grown weak in mind. I wanted to help him, but he is afraid of me.  He thinks that owing to his mental defect he may become less firmly anchored in the true doctrine and thus be misled by me.”

When asked if one gets bored there, Pauchard replied, “Oh no! One does not feel bored here, you may be sure of that.  Unless one brings along that particular sort of spirit, which is not interested in anything or finds fault with everything.  But this kind of mentality has no access to the plane where I live.”

Overall, Pauchard and other spirit communicators report on an active lifestyle on the Other Side once the soul has fully awakened to his or her condition.  “Seen from a mortal point of view, life here may seem empty and monotonous,” Pauchard stated. “But it is far from being so. It is really so intense and radiant, that in comparison, life on earth appears to us like a bad dream, a bad dream on a dark night.” Until religion awakens to this, it seems likely that it will continue to lose members.  Instead of wishing that the person “rest in peace,” in the grave until some far-off day of judgment, it might begin by wishing for a very active lifestyle for the recently departed soul.

Michael Tymn is the author of The Afterlife Revealed: What Happens After We Die, Resurrecting Leonora Piper: How Science Discovered the Afterlife, and Dead Men Talking: Afterlife Communication from World War I.
His latest book, No One Really Dies: 25 Reasons to Believe in an Afterlife is published by White Crow books.

Dear Stafford,

While looking at comments on Mike’s latest excellent blog I noticed Jon’s advert for your own book, and read the chapter that Jon uses as a sample of its contents. I agree enthusiastically with all you write in that chapter, and though watching the outflow of pennies from my bank account, intend to order a copy of the book via Amazon. By the way, I noticed no typographic errors in that chapter, which pleased me greatly. Some other books of excellent content fall short on that merely technical matter.

Eric Franklin email address <erf678@gmail.com>

No doubt my ‘approval’ of anyone else’s comment is of no value, but I would like to say that I do agree with both the intention and the view implicit in Amos’s message to Bruce of a day or two ago. I think the thread which we each seem to be in God’s tapestry does not break when we leave Earth-life but continues in what the physicist would recognise as the flowing Elsewhere of our universe (the flow being flow through “time”), which is to say another universe infinitesimally distant from ours, but communicating with it only at rare moments and under rarely-obtaining conditions, such as those of the sincere séance. I do not know why this concept seems so difficult to understand, and find it even better as a metaphor than that of threads in a tapestry. But each to his/her own metaphor, of course. We must allow each other much more than just that. Science is wholly metaphors.

Eric Franklin

Dear all,

“Steve Trueblue” tells us that God is saying (and I quote) “Get to know Me personally through My written Word and your time of fellowship with Me.” Human (mis)interpretation of written words rather than listening to the still small voice sounds to me like a fall back into exactly that morass of the human mind’s own errors, the man-made religions, that Steve condemns (or is he claiming that God Himself is speaking through him this time?). I shall read him again . . . But, as a provisional response before I give what he has posted that additional attention, can Steve explain this apparent anomaly? We heard from him before, maybe two years ago, and I seem to remember being less than satisfied with his rather human reasoning back then. Perhaps he would like to disambiguate his present message. Sorry to be expressing hesitation, but who’s speaking?

Eric Franklin

For Afterlife students its beyond satisfying news that the great religions, that propagate so much fairytale nonsense, are currently under an unexpected attack from none other than God himself. So strong and sustained is the attack it amounts to a welcome demolition of the great religions. So what would be left standing ? Widespread Gnosis or “knowing the holy spirit” Its a naturally occurring internal mentoring voice and other signals provided by God himself as we awaken to what we really are.
Now God for the last 12 months has provided daily
verified messages/lessons thru prophet Julie Green on Rumble. God broadcasts daily future news events
via keywords directly competing with the dying legacy media. And God is scathing toward manmade religions. This is an oft repeated theme. Example
  To My children who are still caught up with religion and religious traditions, I am warning you of great changes in your congregations- no more man-made doctrines, no more being lukewarm, no more living for yourself or by what someone else tells you about Me. Get to know Me personally through My written Word and your time of fellowship with Me. (Gnosis internal voice, and knowing the spirit) And woe to those who doubt the prophets or doubt My Words. Sudden darkness is about to fall on this Earth, and you don’t want to get caught up in this trap. (Internet is going off power blackouts planned) Get up now, My children. Get ready to receive My Glory, which I have already given to you.
This is the theme of listen to ME inside you, rather than corrupt religions and the NWO lies that is mentioned frequently. Here is another -

Start putting ME first in your life. Start to build your faith in Me once again with My Word. Get to know who I really am and not what the world or religion has told you about Me. I will not disappoint you or fail you That’s from lesson titled DECERTIFICATIONS, RESTORATION AND CELEBRATIONS Jan 15
And - My people I, the Lord, have had enough of their (enemies) destruction, their plans and their continued efforts to annihilate My existence on this earth. Enough of their lies about Me, their man-made doctrines, their religion, their constant distractions and deceptions to the world with their news, their movies, their TV shows and everything else they used to lead My people astray. From JUDGEMENTS ARE ABOUT TO RAIN DOWN IN THIS EARTH Jan 8
So for Students of Afterlife great news! The
manmade parts of religions are being demolished right now. God actually says Nobody really knows me. Certainly the religions don’t.

I blog Julie’s transcripts and videos and provide a little commentary—Headline——
To my children who are still caught up with religion and religious traditions. I am warning you of great changes in your congregations. No more manmade doctrines, or what someone else tells you about me
https://blog.truebluehealer.com/index.php/2022/09/14/julie-green-transcript-a-great-silence-is-coming-sept-13/
To find more on the end of religion themes in Gods daily lessons these last 12 months thru Julie Green blogsearch manmade, man made, Religion, religions.
Steve Trueblue

Amos and Chris,
Thank you for your kind wishes. I was not as well connected with the spirit world when my wife died but was worried when their normal chatter went silent for a few weeks before she died.
Amos, I really appreciated the quote from Patience (more than you can imagine) about the tapestry as I kept saying to all in my grief about the tear in the tapestry-how can God allow that to happen?
I suspect that this is a term used in the After Life a lot as they see the big picture.
I was raising my baby daughter then went to the Spiritualist Church about four later after a few major spiritual events. The Medium gave a very accurate message to the two strangers and then many messages followed.
I was already a strong medium so I was able to return the readings. Where does a medium go for messages, to other mediums.
I have started to look through the works of Patience. I think that she saw what I was shown that it is a tapestry with each life a thread. 
As you have mentioned this serves as a meeting place to expand knowledge.
Bruce

Bruce,
Sorry you lost your wife at a young age. Most of us never fully recover from such losses.  You have my sympathy.  In the matter of God’s tapestry of life, I would add that from God’s perspective the tapestry is not torn when a person dies and a thread is broken. The tapestry is perfect, not yet complete but perhaps the consciousness of your wife will add another thread at a later time to continue the perfect pattern that God is weaving. – AOD

Bruce,
Thanks for the link to the well-written article by Loes Modderman about ‘Oromase I and II’. I enjoy expanding my knowledge about psychic activity by people other than the English and the Americans.  I think we all need to be more aware of psychic activities in other countries.  I know for myself I am far too negligent in searching out these things. I appreciate your help. - AOD

Indeed Bruce, there is still little spiritualism in Holland, I suppose, and even less in Belgium where I live.  There are some mediums, some quite good, but there are no mediums like an Elaine Thorpe, Suzanne Giesemann and Lee Carroll ,... who have elaborated messages for humanity. I found only a translation site of the messages of Kryon ( Lee Caŕroll) in Dutch. Maybe it is my task to change that, but I see myself not as a medium. The messages come only by dream to me and I cannot do any readings. I even have never been to a seance.
But I’m gratefull for what spirit is bringing to me and who knows what the future will bring.

Chris,
I came across some Dutch history THE SOCIETY OROMASE
which might be of interest. This was from PSYPIONEER
JOURNAL founded by Leslie Price who was assisted by a friend Garth (also related). http://iapsop.com/psypioneer/psypioneer_v10_n6_jun_2014.pdf
Bruce

Amos,
Thank you for the reference to Patience words that she compares all of life to a tapestry woven by God or ‘man’ with each individual life providing a thread in that tapestry.
I was much younger when I lost my first wife. I kept saying The tapestry is torn as I saw the tapestry with each life like a thread. My wife was one of those people who was above the rest with love so her lost was hard for all. I don’t know why I kept repeating the phrase The tapestry is torn.
In keeping with Michael’s discussion on Pauchard, I was calling for those on the Other Side I knew with any power to assist with her safe arrival.
I like the discussion of Pauchard as one of the Dublin members of SPR, Rev James Barlow was critical on the church view of eternal punishment and wrote Eschatology in 1865 which caused censure by the church.
Bruce

Chris,
I really did mean proton and not positron.  There is a big difference.  I get confused sometimes.  - AOD

The repetitive question ’why’ leads to an divine entity and we are all part of it. The countless in the One. That is what I belief.

Chris,
You asked, “When you look around you and see how nature and all that exists is made and works, don’t you feel that an creator is needed to accomplish all of this?”

I tend to support the theory of “Intelligent Design”.  There are enough thoughts about Intelligent Design to write one or more books about it and several people have done that.  They usually focus of the creation of the individual cell and evolution of its organelles, e.g. DNA and RNA, chromosomes, the nucleus, mitochondria and development of the cell wall, suggesting that these things could not have developed according to Darwin’s theories of evolution and survival of the fittest.
 

I would even have to go back further than that to consider the development of the planet itself.  Most likely earth was spun-off from a exploding neutron star, to orbit that star and subsequently after millions if not billions of years to cool thereby forming a crust around a core of hot magma, which still exists today with neutrons at its center.  As those core neutrons decayed to electrons in orbit around a nucleus of positrons and neutrons the earth expanded breaking the solid crust into individual plates. (Perhaps the earth is still expanding today as fluid core neutrons continue to decay to electrons and positrons.)

Now one has to account for the production of unlimited numbers of hydrogen atoms and oxygen atoms which as the planet cooled appeared and joined together to form copious amounts of water, enough to cover the entire planet and the earth was without form and void.  As the planet continued to expand, dry land appeared as the water receded into the depths.  (This is beginning to sound Biblical!)

A materialist must believe that on this sterile planet “spontaneous generation” occurred to account for the first living cell.  Only one cell perhaps or billions upon billions of cells appeared at the same time by spontaneous generation?

Whoa!  People who believe that have no understanding of the complexity of even the simplest cell and the struggle it would take for individual cells to survive in a hostile environment that surely existed as the earth cooled.  Then one has to account for the development of photosynthesis to provide the energy to allow the cells to thrive and grow.

Well, now what about the evolution of human beings, plants and animals in the world seen around us today? My first question or concern would be ‘WHY?”  Why did those first cells not only survive but apparently were driven to change, to join together, to develop form, for forms to experience variety, for the varieties to adapt to the environment.  Why were the forms impelled to leave a perfectly favorable water environment and move on to a dangerous land of dryness, and threats of bodily injury from a hostile environment that included UV radiation, And, most of all, why did sexual reproduction appear.  Why did cells have to merge so that two cells formed only one cell. Why did cells have to developed meiosis reducing the amount of their genetic material by one-half?  And as humans and other mammals evolved, why the ridiculous development of male and female sexual organs and coitus evolve, Why and how did a placenta evolve for human and other mammalian animals. Why are human breasts not located lower on the body as they are in many other mammals.

(I do have an answer for that question.  The answer is that humans are littoral mammals evolving in a watery environment of the shorelines of land masses.  That environmental niche is not filled by any other primate but is perfectly suited to man evidenced by loss of body hair as seen in other aquatic mammals, development of oil glands in the skin, large flattened feet for standing and walking on muddy and sandy shorelines, and the development of fatty breasts on the upper part of the body allowing human females to nurse their offspring while wading in deep water.  Why not just continue to lay a clutch of eggs that hatch into relatively self-sufficient offspring?  Ah, this is getting ridiculously complicated!)

To answer your question Chris, I see unlimited reasons to believe in “Intelligent Design” That is, I think that there must be a designer, an implementer for all of this. That designer may be more than one.  That is, if we and everything else are connected and one with God, then maybe we are all designers or creators of the reality we experience on planet earth. It is just that what we see as evolution over a long period of time may be happening instantly in another reality.  In a reality without time creation may occur with each creative thought.

One of the things that I think organized religions, especially Christianity, fail to acknowledge is the humor seen in the creation of this reality.  In addition to the beauty of it all, there is great humor even frivolity in the design of plants and animals.  One can see this most easily in the form and plumage of birds and maybe in fish and to a lesser extent in flowers.  And, perhaps the entire age of the dinosaurs was an experiment in form to ludicrous extremes, so much so that the whole thing had to be scraped and a whole new design had to be implemented.  A design that we all live in today.

I could go on ad nauseum Chris, but you get the idea.  I may be a Skeptic but really, I am, as Michael often says, “A blind Groper, searching for truth.  - AOD

Bruce,
Your use of “tapestry” as analogous to each person’s life is similar to a metaphor used by Patience Worth except that she compares all of life to a tapestry woven by God or ‘man’ with each individual life providing a thread in that tapestry. Each thread provides a color to that tapestry as you suggest. The tapestry of life according to Patience would be incomplete or flawed without that one thread—-unimportant or seeming to have a lack of meaning or importance as compared to others.  Each thread is important in the tapestry of life according to Patience Worth. - AOD

Amos,
If you believe that consciousness returns in an other life, you acknowledge that it’s survives dead.
The paintings and poems prove once more,I think, that we live in a sort of illusion…once more proved by the solidness of matter that we observe but is not really there because we can not see the dance of atoms without instruments.
Some mediums told about things that even the clients did not know and proved to be correct.
So it proves that the telepathic theory between medium and client don’t always exists.
When you look around you and see how nature and all that exists is made and works, don’t you feel that an creator is needed to accomplish all of this?

Dear all,
Each missive arrives on this place of sharing, with writers of excellence balancing the various philosophies. I enjoyed seeing Pete from England who has similar training to mine, Elizabeth with the the theme of love, wordsmiths like Eric Dorian Michael and Amos. Each presents a cognizant, consistent and clear communication. I might add some words from a friend of mine.
The phrase unknowing or unwilling to communicate is strange. The other side have done their best however human nature is not wanting advice. Their advice is to love LOVE God as if your soul depended on it. What is this love the they speak of? It is the love of seeing life as beauty for all its faults. Each life is a tapestry, woven to reveal beauty. The life you live has colours from God, the artist. The splashes of colour are there to cover his expression.
The vibrant reds and the soothing blues are the message each has gained from their life. Why would each life be precious unless each is a masterpiece.
Some may see the beauty in these words but others do not. Why are you responsible for those who are blind to such beauty? The same question is asked by those on the other side. Why should they help? The answer is that love is to treat the blind as you would want to be treated. These words convey much but mean so little without the love of their delivery.

After many years of reading reports of parapsychological and/or spiritual happenings, I have come to think that maybe it is not important to know what they all imply or suggest about whether or not God and/or an afterlife exists.  Maybe it is sufficient to just look at them as natural occurrences, something that humans experience from time to time. Maybe the meaning of such things is not for humans to know, at least not now.

It is a fact that some humans report experiencing things which they think suggest a source from another reality or a “spirit world”.  Whether or not that is true is irrelevant in my opinion.  The fact is that these supernatural experiences of human beings do occur.  People do report seeing apparitions.  Some mediums do provide information to sitters than was only known to the sitter or to a deceased person.  Some people do report tables that tip, musical instruments that play by themselves, knocks and direct voices and people that levitate to the ceiling or in and out of windows.  These reports are facts.  But what is reported may or may not have actually happened as reported. That’s where the debate begins.
 

There are some things however which I think are highly evidential and difficult to explain or debate away suggesting perhaps some kind of interaction between another reality and the physical earth reality in which most of us live.  I find the following things difficult to explain.

I cannot conceive of a natural explanation for the precipitated paintings of the Bangs sisters and the Campbell brothers.  They left behind hard evidence one can touch of superb paintings of deceased persons that they had no way of knowing what they looked like and considering just the process and quality of the art work, one is at a loss to explain how such perfection of detail could be manifested in a matter of a few minutes with no one touching the canvas. Even an experienced portraitist would have to spend hours or days producing such quality work.

In the same category as the precipitated paintings are the so-called ‘automatic writing’ of Pearl Curran, Geraldine Cummins and others.  Their works are tangible evidence that at least shows that humans have abilities which are currently unknown to science. The writings do exist and can be considered by anyone to decide whether or not the writers produced such works through their subconscious mind or it was given to them, dictated as it were, by some other entity not existing in the reality in which they, Geraldine and Pearl lived.

These two things, precipitated paintings and the ‘automatic’ writing of Cummins and Curran are not subject to great debate.  Such paintings and writing do exist.  They were done by human beings using some process not currently known. Whether or not there was involvement by spirits of the deceased is not provable at this time. The paintings and automatic writings do exist and can be seen or read by anyone but they do not prove that God exists.

In my opinion however the material produced by Pearl Curran, considering her lack of ability to consciously produce such material, is the pièce de resistance of automatic writing, spirit-dictated writing, mediumship or whatever one wants to call it. I cannot say enough about the unfathomable meaning of all of the writing of Patience Worth through Pearl Curran.  Words fail me as I read and reread the varying English dialects, produced by Pearl Curran; someone with an inferior eighth grade education and little interest or knowledge of history, language, world geography, ancient cultures and people, all of which are shown with superior knowledge of actual experience in her writing. The simplicity of an afterlife and all-encompassing love of God and man that Patience Worth writes about resonate with me as she appeals to some innate knowledge within myself.
 

It is true that some people report experiences proved to be those of a person who once lived but is now deceased. It is a fact that many children report such memories; memories of experiences and knowledge that no child of 3 or 4 years old could possibly know.  That is a fact.  Such children do exist.  The source of their memories and what it all means are open to debate but nevertheless children who should not know—-do know and sometimes they even have residual marks on their body related to a past life, e.g., birthmarks, scars, missing fingers.  Some retain prior skills and abilities or interests of a prior life.  These reincarnation stories reported by little children are difficult to explain away but they do occur. That is a fact.  Do they validate God or life after death?  No, not really but they do suggest continued existence of consciousness and perhaps return to life in another physical form by that consciousness. Does everyone return to physical existence? No one knows.

People do have near death experiences (NDE) in an altered state of reality, some experiences lasting seconds while other may last many minutes with an isolated case lasting for hours. It is a fact that some or many people now feel more comfortable about reporting an NDE so the numbers seem to be increasing thanks to exposure on internet websites. This seems to be a natural experience that some, but not all, people report when near death or in a physical or emotional crisis. NDEs do not prove that God exists or that consciousness survives death but they suggest that for some people the death process, as far as their consciousness is concerned may be peaceful and comforting.
 

It is undeniable that some mediums today, provide unquestionable valid information from people who are deceased.  That does not mean that that information actually came from that deceased person but the fact is that a human being——a medium—-is able to discern information about a person and his or her family that at times no one other than the family knows. This is not evidence that God exists or that one survives death.  But it is a fact that some people are able to naturally do this.

What I am trying to say is that maybe we need to detach these so-called ‘psychic’ experiences and reports from any efforts to provide evidence that God exists or that consciousness survives death of the physical form.  These things do happen.  They may be natural things produced by a physical organism in its natural state of evolution and have no relevance to survival or God.  When the time is ripe perhaps science will discern more abilities of what a human being can naturally do or experience.  Whether or not God exists or consciousness survives death is a topic for another day.  - AOD

Dear all,

I’d like to be allowed again to express the simple fact of complete empathy with the feelings of Elizabeth, of Pete Marley, and of Michael (Tymn) himself, and virtually complete agreement with the facts they each recite.

As Newton said a while back, we who read and benefit from Mike’s astonishing and still-growing series of ‘blogs’ are like his congregation - though most of us, I think, prefer not to see ourselves as members of a merely humanly-devised church, but as individuals seeking truth. It is surely impossible to believe that the ‘God’ (however we conceive that Great Being) Who sees our striving in thought to find Her/Him would ignore our sincerity and let us perish. And, as Jon has said, some have experiences so impressive that they KNOW what others of us still strive to believe. As the Apostle Paul is recorded as saying, we have no alternative to faith, but it is faith in a God who is Hirself faithful.

Eric Franklin

I’d say that it is not just the knowledge of the continuity of life after physical death that transforms our life and imbues it with meaning.

As most NDErs and all mystics teach us, it is also, and predominantly, the knowledge that we are loved and that love—learning to receive and give it—is the purpose of our earthly existence.

We were created by Love, through Love, and for Love—for God is love, as the apostle John says in his gospel. And that is the main lesson of nearly all NDEs and the teachings of mystics.

Knowing that we are loved and that we are capable of giving and receiving love, and that this is our main task in this life, one which we will continue after physical death, has a tremendous potential to transform our lives by imbuing it with a deep sense of purpose and peace that surpasses all understanding.

Having gone through the mourning period of our late queen, living in England it has been very hard for people not to focus on the existential questions posed by her death.
I regularly swing from being a convinced spiritualist to nihilist in the course of a day, hour etc etc I was reading about Richet again last night and find him interesting. He saw things with his naked eye that proved to him the existence of spirits. Having had the experiences though in the days and weeks following he started to doubt what he had seen because the implications posed such a threat to his everyday beliefs as a working scientist.
Colin Wilson towards the end of his life concluded that only the spirit hypothesis made any sense in the end. However it still did not help him answer the WHY question, why are we here, why do we suffer etc.
I read the autobiography of the late English spiritualist Eric Hatton who knew many of the well known mediums of the 20th century and witnessed events like materialisations and transfigurations. Again he states in his book as to the meaning of it all he said he had no clue whatsoever.
I believe in the world is spirit but when we start talking about purgatory, life reviews and the like I am left cold. Life is clearly manifestly unfair and random just read a daily paper !
I have been reading this stuff for 50 years, the paranormal has been proved but as to what to make of it………
Pete M England

Dorian,

I have had the same questions and still, to some extent, have them, which is why I always say I’m at 98.8% in my conviction, or 1.2% doubt.  However, that 98.8% is enough to provide me with the peace of mind necessary to continue on through this crazy world. I believe Imperator gave the best answer to your question when he/they said:  “We have frequently said that God reveals Himself as man can bear it.  It must needs be so. He is revealed through a human medium, and can only be made known in such measure as the medium can receive the communication.  It is impossible that knowledge of God should outstrip man’s capacity.  Were we now to tell you – if we could – of our more perfect theology it would seem to you strange and unintelligible.  We shall, by slow degrees, instill into your mind so much of truth as you can receive, and then you shall see your present errors. But that is not yet.  Indeed, since the conception which each frames for himself is to him his God, it cannot be that revelation can be in advance of capacity. It is in the nature of things impossible.”  The bottom line here is that I have no problem in accepting that my capacity to full grasp it all is limited, though it is slowly expanding. 

Preliminary to that is what has often been discussed at this blog—that we are not supposed to know it all with absolute certainty (100% certainty), as it would be in conflict with the Divine Plan, which requires that we never stop searching for truth.  I hesitate to use the Martin Luther/Victor Hugo quote again, as I have used it so often here, but, in effect, when Hugo asked the spirit identifying himself as Martin Luther why God doesn’t better reveal Himself, Luther said that “doubt is the instrument which forges the human spirit.”  The bottom line here is that absolute certainty about it all is not in our best interest and that our doubts help us push on. 

If I had all the answers, I’d probably look for a quicker escape from this insane world.  But I’m content to know that consciousness survives death in a larger world and that I’ll continue to progress from there.

Dear Dorian,

Your thought very welcome . . .

Perhaps some know they are what we call ‘dead’ when, and only when, they see their own unmoving and suddenly-alien body as they depart.

Eric Franklin

Dear all,

Having now read Mike’s latest blog a few non-hurried times I would like to express my thanks to Mike for mention of Pauchard (a new name to me) and agreement with all my fellow commenters, Elizabeth, Stafford, Don, and (new names to me) MickyD and Roger Straughan. It is very pleasing to be in such close agreement with fellow thinkers and believers about the nature of our livingness. We make our own worlds, and the higher we grow, ethically, the more rational, and the more enjoyable, they seem to become. Losing out badly in this present world (as in my own life) begins to seem unimportant at last. Better Consciousness lies ahead, and it won’t be much longer now.

Eric Franklin

Sorry for the rough-hewn sentence:

“if there are other morals to be drawn from the afterlife, one has to truly wonder how it can be done when the spirits themselves are apparently unable and unwilling to educate us on that.”

The claim may well be seen as blatantly untrue, even by myself. It depends on many factors, including the mood of the moment. My mind was simply on the high degree of uncertainties involved in the communication with the spirit world, emphasized many times by scholars on this blog. Of course, the appeal of the information at our disposal is also great.

Dr. Betty if you can communicate a contact method via Michael T I’ll try and arrange a link up. Can’t make any promises of course but I can pass on your interest.

“Dealing with Existential Angst” 

Related to this, as well as Betty’s comment, these past few days I had the temptation to post bellow your article “Getting to the Root Cause of World Madness” (Dec. 2021), as I wondered in myself:

While the root cause of world madness is in the lack of perceived meaning in life ... how does the belief in the afterlife provide people with a sense of meaning?

Quoting from there: “If and when he accepts the overwhelming evidence that conscious personal existence does continue beyond the grave, he will wish to treat his continuing life as a whole, and modify in thought, word and deed the natural and instinctive expression of his personality so as to accord with a long-term policy, instead of thinking only of the little period which he spends on earth,” wrote Hugh Dowding (1882 – 1970).

Evidently, he wrote these words at the tail end of an era of optimism. It was an optimism that through technology, and gained new knowledge, people will build a better world far into the future.

For example, it was an age when people expected that replacement of human labour with machines will lead to great increases in leisure time.

It was also an age when the wide spread literacy led to dreams of common people perusing great books, with improvements in the popular wisdom difficult to even imagine.

The conservative author Malcolm Muggeridge wrote about the failure of these and other similar expectations.

If we believe in the past as a teacher, let us look at the past.

The premodern times have probably witnessed higher degrees of belief in the afterlife than our time.

Parallelly, they have also witnessed much higher rates of homicide.

In the recent centuries, the growing systematical understanding of the natural world failed to lead to a better management of the natural resources. In fact, there is evidence that prehistoric peoples were much better managers or stewards of their natural habitats. (https://anthroecologycom.wordpress.com/2017/09/30/thoughts-on-human-evolution-what-if-modern-behaviour-and-cognition-come-first/)

One moral that one can draw from the knowledge of the afterlife, that “we reap what we sow,” may well stimulate self-awareness and rigor. But, that may well be an awareness and rigor of a calculating economist, for in itself the notion of afterlife fails to provide the core knowledge, namely : _what_ is valuable. 
It can leave us strangers to our selves, prone to self-deception.  For example, with a forethought of his afterlife, one may engage in a number of philantropic activities, establish humanitarian foundations… while himself remaining a loveless philistine, as well as a prey to malicious manipulation…  of forces from this world or beyond it.

And, if there are other morals to be drawn from the afterlife, one has to truly wonder how it can be done when the spirits themselves are apparently unable and unwilling to educate us on that.

However, it is not the point of this post to argue of the idea’s worthlessness. It is, instead, to report faithfully of one’s reader’s agnostic reflections on this matter. 

To be clear, there are other facets of the situation to be discussed. Among other things, this article points to the growing obsoleteness of the current religious and scientific institutions, which is truly ..

Another thought at the back of my mind is this : Let’s not kid ourselves that this is all a distant teaching with no direct applications.
For example: What if _I_ am the one who has died?  There is hardly a way to establish objectively that it is one way or another.
Which brings me to wonder: What if the metaphorical and poetic interpretation of these spirit teachings is_ the right one? What if we’re both dead and alive, in different aspects of the full reality??

Cordially,

The nihilists need just one NDE or mystical experience to open their hearts and minds to the reality of life after physical death.

I agree with MickeyD. Charles has long shown an openness to our worldview. I wish he would write a book about it or at least recommend some of ours. Does anyone know how to reach him?

He could have a profound impact on the UK. That nation must be hungry for more meaning than it presently sees. They just need a powerful leader. And Charles writes well.based66

Mickey D…

That is immensely interesting. Given the new King’s apparent conservatism/traditionalism, a Pauchard-type mindset is the very last thing I would have suspected was hiding in his psyche. I wonder if it might possibly have been Diana’s influence (although I confess I don’t really have a clue as to where her head was either…)

Mike, Thanks for highlighting Pauchard, one of my favourite after-death communicators, whom so few seem to have heard of.  He never fails to offer something thought-provoking and illuminating - for me at least! I only discovered him years ago via Paul Beard’s excellent ‘Living On’.

Another puzzle posed by the Queen’s death and funeral was why the clergy seemed to go along with popular sentiment in viewing it all as a ‘tragedy’ needing to be ‘mourned’.  Why should those holding to orthodox Christian doctrines see the death of a very elderly and frail lady destined for eternal bliss in this light?  The service also exposed yet again the obvious contradictions within those doctrines.  Are we to expect to find ourselves at death face to face with God or Jesus, or do we face the ‘Big Sleep’ for perhaps many millenia until a ‘final judgment’?  Both can’t be true, and Pauchard’s form of ‘purgatory’ seems a sensible alternative, supported by many afterlife accounts.

I can confirm on the basis of first hand information that one person at the ceremony - the new King - is very much of the Pauchard way of thinking.

Dear all,

Having read Mike’s latest blog in EXTREME haste (busy day), the only brief comment I want to offer at this moment is that true science MUST BE part of the Great Being, God, so if honest science leads us to even begin to have a belief and trust in that Great Being as itself a FACT of science, that will be a first step, no doubt with purgatorial effects to follow, in moulding the consciousness towards the form that will enable us to go consciously and smoothly into the next universe when we leave this one, and not fall asleep, to waken again only later. Also today, Jon has sent me an email with an article of his own explaining how some of us KNOW what we believe, though others still suffer doubt. His thoughts are very valuable. The whole matter needs our sincere comment and discussion to show the truth in detail, and perhaps that will come out in discussion of the new blog. My own view: science is vastly preferable to the statements of established churches that no longer really believe even the myths they proclaim, and a scientic religion is preferable because science is part of God. I have no time to make this less rambling - busy day.

Eric Franklin