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Mystical Christianity
Translated and excerpted from a talk given by Swami Kriyananda at Ananda Italy, Easter 2000.
Right Attitude
Today we are living in a period based particularly on psychology. Many
people go to psychiatrists, thinking they can correct things superficially,
using only the mind. It is true that with a good attitude you can overcome
a defeat, a suffering, a test. You can change yourself, but that is not
the whole story. The problem with this kind of thinking is the thought
that it is I who must do it all. We should do everything we can, but we
must remember that the grace of God is also at work here. It is much better
to say not only, “I want to have and keep a good attitude,”
but, “I give this attitude to You, God.” Instead of praying,
“When will You come to me, when will You come, Lord?” say, “I
give myself to You, I am Yours.” What you give, you will receive.
When you suffer, think of offering even more to God. There is a beautiful
verse in the Bhagavad Gita where God says, “If in all your efforts
to know Me, you fail, then offer Me your failure.” When we give God
even that, we will see that it is not failure at all.
I Am Always with You
When Jesus was resurrected, he said, “I am always with you,” and it is true He is. That “I” that Jesus talks about is a symbol. When Mary Magdalene saw him in the garden he said to her, “Don’t touch me, I am not yet resurrected.” What did he mean? In divine stories there are always symbols. The symbol in this case is that he, and every soul, has three levels to pass through in order to reach perfect freedom in God.
We have many veils around us that keep us from this freedom, especially
on the material level. We need to remove these veils, like those that
surround our mind: the thoughts of “me,” the thoughts of the
things we desire, the awareness of having hurt someone. However, to remove
these veils alone is an impossible job. No one can do it alone. Yogananda
said that 25% of the spiritual path is your personal effort, 25% is the
guru’s effort on your behalf, and 50% is the grace of God. All three
are essential for reaching Him. You cannot do much by yourself, but the
little that you can do will take a lot of will power. Don’t think
that God will do it all. If you look at the lives of the saints, you see
examples of heroic love and of heroic will power. If you use all your
will power to overcome a test, you experience a type of resurrection –
but not like that of Jesus. You may feel better, closer to God, more joyful
– but that is not all of it. What we need to seek is the grace of
God – which came on earth through Jesus’ life, and especially
through his resurrection. There is a beautiful song that Yogananda sang
to the Divine Mother, saying, “Oh my child, ask of Me salvation,
but don’t ask for My love. If you ask Me for My love I must give
you all of it, and I would be poor.” Divine Mother is really saying,
“Ask for My love, because God’s love is everything.”
The Astral World
There are levels of salvation. There is a level of salvation that comes with the freedom from the need to return in a human body. You can live in the astral world and not have to return here on earth. This is a blessed state, and in the higher heavens there is incredible beauty. You are surrounded by angels and by other liberated souls. You don’t have to mix with bad or egoistical people.
At the beginning, devotees who die go to this astral region, but they are not free enough to develop spiritually there. They don’t have the possibility to advance because it is too beautiful and there is no incentive. In this world you have the incentive. You see ugliness and evil and think, “I don’t want this.” Here you have the incentive to seek a better life. In heaven you think you have it already, so you relax. Little by little, however, your subconscious desires begin to rise again, and you think, “It was beautiful to have a wife, to have children, to act through a body that can do many things.” You feel a little sentimental, and finally you return to earth in order to finish this story. It is not that parents create or invite a newborn baby. It is the soul who chooses the parents. A mother I know once scolded her small child. He was upset and cried, and said to her, “You weren’t even my first choice!” She asked him, “Who was your first choice?” and he answered, “A mother in the Philippines.” We continue to return to the physical plane until we finish the karma that brings us here.
The human mind finds it difficult to imagine an eternity in heaven. Imagine
billions of years always in the same garden, always with the same ego,
always even with the same astral body. I cannot think of a better definition
of hell. It would certainly be hell to be always imprisoned in the ego.
Beyond this astral world there is the causal world – that is, the
cause of everything – a world of ideas. There the body is minimal,
there is no longer an ego. You are almost like God, with enormous power,
and only slightly limited by desires. The beings on that level create
other universes, many as big as this one. It seems impossible, but in
reality you are much more than you think you are.
The Example of Jesus
Jesus came to earth not only to make us understand that he loves us,
but to make us understand that where he came from, we can go also. Many
times he witnessed events taking place far from him, saying, for example,
“When two or more are gathered together in my name, I am there in
the midst of them.” He said “I am,” not “I will be,”
because he was not thinking of the future – but of the Eternal Present.
We see many Sunday services around the world among Christians. Also in
India many people celebrate Christian holidays, because they see that
God is manifested in all religions. How can Jesus be present in every
church? He was not speaking of his body – his body was only a manifestation
of his spirit. He is already omnipresent. We cannot imagine that state
of existence, it is so different from our own. We are not omnipresent
even in this body. Omnipresence in this body means to be centered in every
atom of our body, to feel ourselves in every atom. Even this state we
cannot understand. We are centered in the ego, which is tiny, like an
atom. When you get out of the ego, you see that every atom is your center.
Yogananda said that God’s vision is “center everywhere, circumference
nowhere.” That state awaits you. Don’t think that you need only
to have a good attitude, then God will bless you. It is beautiful to view
from infinity the truth of who we really are. We have come from the infinite,
and we must return to that level.
Christian Symbols
At the beginning and at the end of Jesus’ life there are two very
important symbols. The second symbol is the Crucifixion and the Resurrection.
The first symbol is the star. The three wise men, who were in reality
masters, were able to see that in Jesus birth in this body the infinite
Christ consciousness was born on earth. When you see the spiritual eye,
you see at the center a star, symbolizing the Cosmic consciousness of
God. Seeing that star on a person means that that star is born in him.
Jesus came as an incarnation of God – not as a saint, but much more.
God, through the consciousness of Jesus, incarnated on earth. Jesus was
not unique – God does this with every master who is liberated and
returns to earth with this liberation. It would be a shame if we could
not reach that level ourselves. Jesus said in the Book of Revelation,
“I am outside the door and knock. Whoever opens the door and lets
me in, I will sit with him and sup with him.” There is a lot of truth
hidden there, because people were not yet ready to understand. We need
to do what he did, to become what he was, and what he still is now. He
wants from us this above all, and we cannot do it only with psychological
methods of self-change. It isn’t possible. With that kind of work
you can perhaps leave behind some problem in your life, maybe the pain
that someone caused you or that you caused someone. You can leave one
room of this house, and think yourself free, but it is only one room.
You are still imprisoned in the house of ego, so this is not freedom.
Freedom cannot come by psychological methods, it can come only through
the grace of God and guru.
The Resurrection of Christ in Our Hearts
This is why Jesus came, why the great masters came, why Yogananda came – to give us the strength to move beyond the veils and find freedom in God. When you pray, don’t pray, “Help me.” It is much better to say, “I come from You, I want You, I give myself to You.” Think in a giving way, not in an egotistical way. The Resurrection is a beautiful symbol with many levels of truth. The more we live that reality in every moment of our lives, the more we will see that He is truly resurrected in our hearts, and we are resurrected more and more in Him.
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