The Father II
October 7, 1999
Because he hath set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him: I will set him on high, because he hath known my name. He shall call upon me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him, and honour him.
We started with a member who was not present last session. She described how little feeling she had for her father, who was an invalid requiring most of her mother's attention. Thus, she lacked a significant relationship with both her father and her mother. This unfortunate beginning left her adrift not only in friendships and romance but in work situations as well. Eventually various addictions took charge and gave her a kind of numb survival. Today she is recovering through 12-Step programs and of course practicing Christian Science.
Having fully assessed, in our last two meetings, and part of this one, the destruction wrought by inadequate parenting, we wanted to share strategies and insights in Christian Science which could help us revision our lives, and go forward in health and joy. Here's some of what we came up with.
1) Father and Mother, as well as Father-Mother, are colorful, suggestive terms for Deity. We do not disown them, but feel they merely hint at the underlying Truth, which we want to access as a living presence. In this regard our focus quote, above, and the following leapt forth: "From the infinite elements of the one Mind emanate all form, color, quality, and quantity, and these are mental, both primarily and secondarily," (Science and Health, p. 512:21-25). Divine radicalism seems essential on this work, wherein faith in matter or dualism is dropped and we derive all qualities of ourselves and others directly from God.
2) The notion of an origin, derivation, source, etc., is not Science. God-man is one being, without cause, chronology or development. The various material beliefs like birth, death, parentage, family, etc., are mythological representations of eternal Life, God. Science-fiction can be fun — certain truths can be gathered from it, but bottom line we wouldn't want to live it directly.
3) Genetics is true only as long as it is divine, not mortal. Outline, form, color, traits, inclinations, etc. — whatever is "caused" by genes — need upgrading to divine Genetics, the Cause that is all effects.
4) When we find ourselves turned on or off by so-called powerful persons — i. e. parental stand-ins like bosses, teachers, politicians, church leaders, shamans, swamis, etc. — there is undoubtedly a projection of our own unconscious contents going on. This must be reeled in and carefully looked at — is it something from the childhood, perhaps something more archetypal? Once this is seen properly and the energies are thereby engaged, it is usually a simple step to let the impersonal Truth hidden therein be discerned and assume its rightful control. Half-baked theories and their promoters fade out.
5) Interest in history, ancestry, astrology, family trees, psychological reconstruction, etc., are mythological representations of the desire to seek God. This latter is in itself a mythological quest. And what does it all mean? It's very simple — God is already the being of man and the universe.
6) Intergenerational dating may involve massive parental-filial projections needing attention, by pulling them back and evaluating their nature, as we saw above, before surrendering to the Science always ready to burst forth. If one lives his own divinity directly rather than in projection the unfoldment of the relationship should be smoother.
7) Last week we discussed the examples of dysfunctional parenting displayed in the new movie "American Beauty". There is also a deeper "parental" presence, a kind of overarching beneficent Deity in the mode of A Course in Miracles or the Emmanuel series. To reach the Science of the happenings, one would need to see that God is not the special possession of the dead — although it is a wonderful metaphor for letting go — and integrate Him into everyday life.
8) Anger about having received bad parenting is understandable, but we felt, based on experience, that screaming sessions (either professionally induced or just lashing out at someone) are valueless for healing and quite destructive of relationships. Stuffing the anger is also ill-advised: it can lead to addictions, for one thing, and depression. Better, is the step-by-step process of reclaiming one's innate power as the reflection of God and dealing with daily events from that position.
We'll look at "City Of Joy" for the next two weeks. This is the theme of the Emergence International conference to be held in Philadelphia, October 14-17. Those wishing to participate in the work could start with pp. 572-578 in Science and Health, where Mrs. Eddy discerns the Science of the New Jerusalem.
Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.
Philip saith unto him, Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us. Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.
Closed to error, it is open to Truth, and vice versa. The Father in secret is unseen to the physical senses, but He knows all things and rewards according to motives, not according to speech.
Jesus acknowledged no ties of the flesh. He said: "Call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven." Again he asked: "Who is my mother, and who are my brethren," implying that it is they who do the will of his Father. We have no record of his calling any man by the name of father. He recognized Spirit, God, as the only creator, and therefore as the Father of all.
If man were solely a creature of the material senses, he would have no eternal Principle and would be mutable and mortal.
We must look deep into realism instead of accepting only the outward sense of things.
XXII. Immortal man was and is God's image or idea, even the infinite expression of infinite Mind, and immortal man is coexistent and coeternal with that Mind. He has been forever in the eternal Mind, God; but infinite Mind can never be in man, but is reflected by man. The spiritual man's consciousness and individuality are reflections of God. They are the emanations of Him who is Life, Truth, and Love.
Beholding the infinite tasks of truth, we pause,—wait on God. Then we push onward, until boundless thought walks enraptured, and conception unconfined is winged to reach the divine glory.
Ignorance was the first condition of sin in the allegory of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. Their mental state is not desirable, neither is a knowledge of sin and its consequences, repentance, per se; but, admitting the existence of both, mortals must hasten through the second to the third stage,—the knowledge of good; for without this the valuable sequence of knowledge would be lacking,—even the power to escape from the false claims of sin. To understand good, one must discern the nothingness of evil, and consecrate one's life anew.
Mere historic incidents and personal events are frivolous and of no moment, unless they illustrate the ethics of Truth. To this end, but only to this end, such narrations may be admissible and advisable; but if spiritual conclusions are separated from their premises, the nexus is lost, and the argument, with its rightful conclusions, becomes correspondingly obscure. The human history needs to be revised, and the material record expunged.