Tomberg and Anthroposophy

[Cleric]

It may be helpful, Cleric, if you can paint a picture of what an alternative is for the spiritual soul that desires to live in the intuitive flow and contribute the fruits of its prayerful and meditative work to the spiritualization of education, medicine, political affairs, and so on, through the tools of the intellectual soul. I'm sure you agree that BD's stream simply is not sufficient for this spiritualization of the intellect. So do you still trace the wires of Cosmic Intelligence to the Anthroposophical Society and its various endeavors in these domains? Federica says that is a separate question, but I cannot imagine any other option for those who feel quite satisfied with dismantling the Church or, at least, letting it naturally fade away into oblivion. You may say that there is no desire to dismantle the Church, but nevertheless, it's the unquestionable vision of the future in what you have expressed above. So I'm guessing you still have quite a bit of confidence in the Anthroposophical projects, despite no signs of these projects actually acting as a breeding den for clairvoyant souls. Is that confidence simply rooted in the fact that they seem to speak directly about the fact that the Messiah has already come and is here?

We shouldn't act as if Anthroposophy has offered us an investment plan with promises for a quick return, and now, a hundred years later, we're worried that it may not live up to the expectations (thus, we quickly seek to cash out and reinvest in a more conservative but hopefully safer plan). We are speaking about the evolutionary process of humanity here. Over long spans of time. Whose trajectory depends primarily on what human beings will understand about reality and how they will act upon it, what they will emanate. I don't have any special confidence in the Anthroposophical projects as they are now. In a way, I look at them as completely necessary attempts or even hints. Just like our first essays were necessary attempts, even if clumsy, and sometimes with errors. But this is part of gaining experience, probing, and expanding our intuitive horizons. It is important to notice that because of these attempts, we are at all able to discuss seriously the possibility of the spirit entering into the practical fields of human affairs. Without that, we might as well still live in a default conception of a rigid two-compartment world, with a hard boundary between the material and the spiritual. So with this in mind, we shouldn’t forget that these things are still incubating. Before we expect the World the change, we should see that change within ourselves.

Thus, what I have confidence in is the Spirit at work. I have confidence in the gradual inversion of our inner attitude. In the age of the intellectual soul, it can be said that our inner activity needs to be tethered to certain intuitive gestures and sensations. These are ToE principles for the scientist; they are the dogma-axioms for the religious. They give anchorage to the intellectual self. With the development of the spiritual soul, the most important thing is the inversion, to find that our true tether is in the spiritual world, in the invisible Sun.

This is the primary thing. We may grumble about the lack of World-scale results, but I don’t think anyone would deny the power of the Teachings of the new impulse to incite the transformation on an individual level. Thus, to me, "For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them" is like a motto. This is the living, tangible reality – the inner immersion in the Divine, and having the constant desire to transform ourselves, such that we can conduct the currents in better and better ways, and to comprehend the depth of reality.

I’m pretty sure no one here would disagree with the above. So we reach the actual point of discourse – what is the role of the Church in all this? It is said that there’s a failure to engage in the conversation and it is constantly pulled in the other direction. But in my view, this is precisely the engagement. Clearly, I have left the impression that I attack the project of mere ignorance or prejudice. Here’s an attempt to summarize what we have.

So we have three main pillars.

1/ One is the intricate symbolic choreography that Rodriel develops, the John-Peter dynamics, and so on. The basic goal here is to show that it is in the wisdom of the Gospels that the role of the Church has been preordained. That’s OK, although even you expressed your concern that, in this respect, things are no different than Astrology, where we can massage the symbols to make them look as support for almost anything. If we make it our goal, I’m sure anyone will be able to choreograph a symbology that supports a different view. For example, we can take Christ’s words above and use them as strong evidence that he never suggested that the new life needs to be somehow tied with worldly institutions - the important thing is to unite in his name. After all, if manipulation of symbols could lead to the Truth, there wouldn’t be so many Christian denominations who read the symbols differently, would there?

2/ The second pillar is the subtle indications that the Church is growing in tolerance and openness. Officials have spoken positively about MoT, and even the Pope has it on his desk. To this, I said that we shouldn’t be in a hurry to celebrate. MoT is written in such a way that it can be very well utilized as a tool to support and empower the Peter Church in its dogmatic form.

3/ The third is Tomberg himself. We basically say that if this personality, who went as deep as one can get in all fields of spirituality, finally concluded that the John impulse only has a chance of taking root if planted within the Church, then there’s probably something to it. For this, I too presented my thoughts.

So when we combine the three pillars, it is completely possible to feel a surge of confidence. I completely get that. I completely get that one can say, “Maybe we’ve underestimated the place of the Church. Maybe it is indeed the best place where the higher consciousness will gradually flourish.” However, to me, this subtly shifts the focus which was designated as primary. Now there’s a very clear entanglement between the evolutionary path of humanity and the destiny of the Church organism. If they prevail, they prevail together. If they fall, they fall together. This kind of entanglement is completely unwarranted in my view. Just as I wouldn’t tie the future of humanity with the success of some particular Anthroposophical project, so I wouldn’t tie it with the success of the Catholic project. What I would certainly tie it with, however, is this inner and outer work that has been tasked upon us by the Teachers of the new impulse. A work that begins humbly, where there are two or three.

So, far from being prejudiced and dismissive out of hand, in the discussions, I simply provided counterbalances to the three pillars, with the sole reason of showing that things are not as straightforward as they may seem. And this is not difficult to survey. It’s actually a little odd how the basic mood is like, “Since spiritual science has failed to deliver, we turn to the Church”, as if the Church has shown its superior capacity to deliver the new life. Do we forget that the Church, as it is now, is practically opposed to the truths of spiritual science? So isn’t it strange that we throw all our hope and confidence into an institution that is yet to change its ways, if it is to ever deliver what we hope for? This reminds me of the way we used to joke as children about someone, “Yeah, he is her boyfriend, they date, but she doesn’t know it.” So in a similar sense, we’ve laid down the family plan up until the Omega point, but the Church-bride has no clue about this. We haven’t even asked her if she likes us.

I understand the warm feelings we may harbor for the bride, but we shouldn’t blind ourselves to the forces that may manifest in this context. In the project, there still hovers in the air the conviction that the Church is a manifestation of Christ, and as such, everything is divinely predestined to turn out for the good. At the same time, however, we need to have our eyes wide open, that the Church is one of the most appetizing structures for the adversaries of evolution. We can hardly imagine a more powerful tool through which the soul life of a large portion of humanity could be steered in a desired direction. I don’t say this as a prejudice. It’s a fact. We simply need to keep our eyes open for it (obviously, these forces would try to sabotage any movement, not only the Church. And here’s the important thing – whether the members are prepared to recognize how these forces work from within themselves). If we put aside the Church for a moment, we can be sure that there are forces which very powerfully strive to keep the Earthly matrix in such a state that the conviction is maintained that the Earth is the Earth, while if there’s anything else, it only tangentially touches upon our existence. If we were in the place of these forces, wouldn’t we see in the Church a perfect tool for maintaining this conviction? Wouldn’t we do everything in our power to inspire the officials to maintain that trajectory? This is something we need to be clear about. One of the greatest fallacies would be to convince ourselves that the Church is predestined to be the Wellspring of the Good, and we only need to anticipate its transformation while trying to whisper to this or that person about MoT.

So my view is pretty simple. We have work to do for lifetimes to come. Work, which does not depend on being a formal member of this or that church, and which is not entangled with its fate. If enough souls work seriously on the inversion and the Sun-tethering, then there will be conditions to bring new life to any institution. Or if the institution is not receptive to that life, a new form will be crystallized. But the three pillars are simply not something that can incite me to put all my confidence and energy in the Church-bride. Isn’t it fully plausible that, like some femme fatale, she may suck in all our energy, drain all our resources, and in the end say, “What made you think that I want to change and even support your project? Have you asked me?”

Probably, I’ll be accused of painting narrow-minded caricatures again, but these are real possibilities. It is a simple fact that we voluntarily unite the fate of humanity with the fate of an institution. All of that rests on our confidence (supported by no matter how many pillars) that this entity is going to change. And I don’t exclude that possibility, but in a sense, I prefer to be conservative. Yes, it may sound reversed, but when we come to know inner reality, our priorities are actually reversed. Now it is more secure, more certain, to work in accordance with the center that is not of this world. In comparison, the Catholic project looks more radical. It depends on more than one weak linkages in the chain. There are more vectors through which the project can be sabotaged by the adversaries.

Even though the discussion may sound as turning into strongly polarized camps, I don’t take it in that way. As said, I simply prefer to work within the domain of certainty, where I can give all my energy and motivation in a direction that I’m certain is what Christ intends, and the fruits of which will remain in value no matter how the more concrete details turn out. There’s so much work to be done! The Catholic project, on the other hand, demands that I invest energy in trying to devise ways to court the bride, to speak softly in her ear, to coax her, make many compromises, and at all times keep my fingers crossed that she wouldn’t at some point say, “Get lost.” I don’t see this as a divergence of paths at this time, because I know that both you and Rodriel will keep working on the high ideal. The only thing we do not share at this point is the vision that all life will revolve around the bride. I see that everything will revolve around the Living Christ in inner space and the Living Ecclesia, the Universal Brotherhood, and this activity will manifest in the most differentiated, yet synchronistic, ways across the World, even if they cannot be traced on the sensory-intellectual tableau to the 'fully connected graph' of a single institution. As long as this vision doesn’t deter us from working on the primary task, it’s all the same to me. But it will be sad if the obsession with the bride begins to demand too many compromises and one starts to lower the bar, just so that he can maintain a likable face before her.

So what is the riddle of the Church, how it will be transformed (or diffused, as you characterized it before)? What is its place within the spectrum of reality, and how do we give it more musical forms, or do you now feel that there is no place for it or possibility for taking more musical forms, and we (as those who seek the spiritual soul, in keeping with the times) should simply ignore it and let it fade away?

Honestly, I don’t know. If John maintains that he would never direct the Church, this means that it is left to Peter, that is, to faith-based intellect alone. In the new age, when human beings are expected to grow in true and deep self-knowledge and even discover the forces of evil within themselves, such a Peter-only Church will be the easiest prey. It is practically blind; it can be led by the nose. If John changes his view and realizes that the Church has any future only if enlightened human beings work within it, which effectively means that John should direct the Church, then the potential for transformation is great.

[AshvinP]

It may be helpful, Cleric, if you can paint a picture of what an alternative is for the spiritual soul that desires to live in the intuitive flow and contribute the fruits of its prayerful and meditative work to the spiritualization of education, medicine, political affairs, and so on, through the tools of the intellectual soul. I'm sure you agree that BD's stream simply is not sufficient for this spiritualization of the intellect. So do you still trace the wires of Cosmic Intelligence to the Anthroposophical Society and its various endeavors in these domains? Federica says that is a separate question, but I cannot imagine any other option for those who feel quite satisfied with dismantling the Church or, at least, letting it naturally fade away into oblivion. You may say that there is no desire to dismantle the Church, but nevertheless, it's the unquestionable vision of the future in what you have expressed above. So I'm guessing you still have quite a bit of confidence in the Anthroposophical projects, despite no signs of these projects actually acting as a breeding den for clairvoyant souls. Is that confidence simply rooted in the fact that they seem to speak directly about the fact that the Messiah has already come and is here?

We shouldn't act as if Anthroposophy has offered us an investment plan with promises for a quick return, and now, a hundred years later, we're worried that it may not live up to the expectations (thus, we quickly seek to cash out and reinvest in a more conservative but hopefully safer plan). We are speaking about the evolutionary process of humanity here. Over long spans of time. Whose trajectory depends primarily on what human beings will understand about reality and how they will act upon it, what they will emanate. I don't have any special confidence in the Anthroposophical projects as they are now. In a way, I look at them as completely necessary attempts or even hints. Just like our first essays were necessary attempts, even if clumsy, and sometimes with errors. But this is part of gaining experience, probing, and expanding our intuitive horizons. It is important to notice that because of these attempts, we are at all able to discuss seriously the possibility of the spirit entering into the practical fields of human affairs. Without that, we might as well still live in a default conception of a rigid two-compartment world, with a hard boundary between the material and the spiritual. So with this in mind, we shouldn’t forget that these things are still incubating. Before we expect the World the change, we should see that change within ourselves.

Thanks, Cleric, all of this is very helpful to contemplate.

I am assuming you also appreciate, at least to some extent, that what you express above could be spoken in exactly the same way to someone who has dismissed the Catholic project (or any project that imagines the Universal Church will play an indispensable role in the future of humanity). As long as one does not automatically conceive of this project as a regression to the old world-policing, culture-sculpting, soul micro-managing, etc., medieval and early modern functions of the Church, then we could just as easily say, "we shouldn't act as if the Catholic project has offered us an investment plan with promises for a quick return..." We can speak about how VT has provided completely necessary attempts and hints for the potential shapes of this project (perhaps a better phrase than "subtle half-messaging"). We could speak about how, because of his attempts and hints, religious souls within the Church (even if very few, to begin with) can seriously contemplate and discuss the possibility of the Spirit entering through the sacramental life and radiating out into practical affairs. We can talk about how these things are still incubating without calling that "wishful thinking".

Thus, what I have confidence in is the Spirit at work. I have confidence in the gradual inversion of our inner attitude. In the age of the intellectual soul, it can be said that our inner activity needs to be tethered to certain intuitive gestures and sensations. These are ToE principles for the scientist; they are the dogma-axioms for the religious. They give anchorage to the intellectual self. With the development of the spiritual soul, the most important thing is the inversion, to find that our true tether is in the spiritual world, in the invisible Sun.

This is the primary thing. We may grumble about the lack of World-scale results, but I don’t think anyone would deny the power of the Teachings of the new impulse to incite the transformation on an individual level. Thus, to me, "For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them" is like a motto. This is the living, tangible reality – the inner immersion in the Divine, and having the constant desire to transform ourselves, such that we can conduct the currents in better and better ways, and to comprehend the depth of reality.

Again, "two or three gathered in my name" was previously characterized as the silent, subtle work of the Tombergian approach. Yet that "silence" was automatically deemed as code for, "become an ascetic hermit and only pray for other souls to be enlightened from afar". I have also yet to come across a single soul who has deeply contemplated VT/MoT and has denied the power of it to incite the transformation on an individual level.

Speaking of which, some here may be interested in reading some articles from Raphael at The Way of the Heart. His articles are generally rooted in Christian Hermeticism and he discusses Tomberg's conversion specifically in this post.

There is a prevailing belief that the great religions of the world are empty husks, outmoded expressions of the past, and that the future of humanity is individual freedom alone. But really, religion is inescapable. For religion is simply the crystallization and articulation of mysticism. It is gnosis pure and simple. And as much as mystics seek to articulate their experiences of the divine, religion will always be the result.

Now, religion must indeed be periodically renewed by impulses of genuine mysticism and grace, or they do indeed become empty husks, or worse, oppressive ideologies. All religions constantly face this peril. And it is this very danger, I would argue, that Tomberg was seeking to prevent by injecting the dimension of depth into the great religion of Christianity, the most original expression of which is Catholicism.

Like the Kalki Avatar, Tomberg was renewing true dharma, true religion as love in the horizontal dimension, by converting to Catholicism. He was seeking not only to revivify the Catholic stream by reuniting it to the esoteric Church of John, but he was also indicating to a world that had lost faith that religion was not meaningless but essential to the future of humanity. For all true religion nurtures, disciplines, and guides the soul to loving union with God.

I’m pretty sure no one here would disagree with the above. So we reach the actual point of discourse – what is the role of the Church in all this? It is said that there’s a failure to engage in the conversation and it is constantly pulled in the other direction. But in my view, this is precisely the engagement. Clearly, I have left the impression that I attack the project of mere ignorance or prejudice. Here’s an attempt to summarize what we have.

So we have three main pillars.

1/ One is the intricate symbolic choreography that Rodriel develops, the John-Peter dynamics, and so on. The basic goal here is to show that it is in the wisdom of the Gospels that the role of the Church has been preordained. That’s OK, although even you expressed your concern that, in this respect, things are no different than Astrology, where we can massage the symbols to make them look as support for almost anything. If we make it our goal, I’m sure anyone will be able to choreograph a symbology that supports a different view. For example, we can take Christ’s words above and use them as strong evidence that he never suggested that the new life needs to be somehow tied with worldly institutions - the important thing is to unite in his name. After all, if manipulation of symbols could lead to the Truth, there wouldn’t be so many Christian denominations who read the symbols differently, would there?

2/ The second pillar is the subtle indications that the Church is growing in tolerance and openness. Officials have spoken positively about MoT, and even the Pope has it on his desk. To this, I said that we shouldn’t be in a hurry to celebrate. MoT is written in such a way that it can be very well utilized as a tool to support and empower the Peter Church in its dogmatic form.

3/ The third is Tomberg himself. We basically say that if this personality, who went as deep as one can get in all fields of spirituality, finally concluded that the John impulse only has a chance of taking root if planted within the Church, then there’s probably something to it. For this, I too presented my thoughts.

The 4th pillar is the spiritual evolutionary process itself. It is a process of retracing the spiritual foundations of Earthly institutions and kingdoms. For example, I doubt we imagine that the scientific-technological institutions of the modern age (which themselves were born out of the RCC) will simply disappear as humanity's center of coherence grows directly and consciously around the spiritual worlds. It probably sounds much more reasonable that we should plant seeds of transformation from within these institutions, and probably that's what we are doing in real life. None of us belongs to the Anthroposophical Society or has made one of its projects into our career. Instead, we hopefully do our intimate individual work and try to contribute what we can to the institutions we already live in and work with. Why should it be any different with the RCC, which itself is the institution concealed beneath all other institutions of Western civilization?

So when we combine the three pillars, it is completely possible to feel a surge of confidence. I completely get that. I completely get that one can say, “Maybe we’ve underestimated the place of the Church. Maybe it is indeed the best place where the higher consciousness will gradually flourish.” However, to me, this subtly shifts the focus which was designated as primary. Now there’s a very clear entanglement between the evolutionary path of humanity and the destiny of the Church organism. If they prevail, they prevail together. If they fall, they fall together. This kind of entanglement is completely unwarranted in my view. Just as I wouldn’t tie the future of humanity with the success of some particular Anthroposophical project, so I wouldn’t tie it with the success of the Catholic project. What I would certainly tie it with, however, is this inner and outer work that has been tasked upon us by the Teachers of the new impulse. A work that begins humbly, where there are two or three.

So, far from being prejudiced and dismissive out of hand, in the discussions, I simply provided counterbalances to the three pillars, with the sole reason of showing that things are not as straightforward as they may seem. And this is not difficult to survey. It’s actually a little odd how the basic mood is like, “Since spiritual science has failed to deliver, we turn to the Church”, as if the Church has shown its superior capacity to deliver the new life. Do we forget that the Church, as it is now, is practically opposed to the truths of spiritual science? So isn’t it strange that we throw all our hope and confidence into an institution that is yet to change its ways, if it is to ever deliver what we hope for? This reminds me of the way we used to joke as children about someone, “Yeah, he is her boyfriend, they date, but she doesn’t know it.” So in a similar sense, we’ve laid down the family plan up until the Omega point, but the Church-bride has no clue about this. We haven’t even asked her if she likes us.

I understand the warm feelings we may harbor for the bride, but we shouldn’t blind ourselves to the forces that may manifest in this context. In the project, there still hovers in the air the conviction that the Church is a manifestation of Christ, and as such, everything is divinely predestined to turn out for the good. At the same time, however, we need to have our eyes wide open, that the Church is one of the most appetizing structures for the adversaries of evolution. We can hardly imagine a more powerful tool through which the soul life of a large portion of humanity could be steered in a desired direction. I don’t say this as a prejudice. It’s a fact. We simply need to keep our eyes open for it (obviously, these forces would try to sabotage any movement, not only the Church. And here’s the important thing – whether the members are prepared to recognize how these forces work from within themselves). If we put aside the Church for a moment, we can be sure that there are forces which very powerfully strive to keep the Earthly matrix in such a state that the conviction is maintained that the Earth is the Earth, while if there’s anything else, it only tangentially touches upon our existence. If we were in the place of these forces, wouldn’t we see in the Church a perfect tool for maintaining this conviction? Wouldn’t we do everything in our power to inspire the officials to maintain that trajectory? This is something we need to be clear about. One of the greatest fallacies would be to convince ourselves that the Church is predestined to be the Wellspring of the Good, and we only need to anticipate its transformation while trying to whisper to this or that person about MoT.

These are good points, and that's why I have emphasized that we cannot tie our individual or collective destiny to a particular institution and blind ourselves to signs of deviation and regression from the Impulse. That is why I asked Rodriel about what kind of Church developments would be concerning to him, for example (which he contemplated and answered). It is why I first want to see concrete transformations within the Church that make it more open and receptive to the attempted and hinted John infusion. And it is precisely MoT that seeks to help millions, if not billions, of religious souls already existing within the Church sphere to recognize how the subhuman forces work from within themselves, without which they may never get such an opportunity. The worrying thing is that, if we carelessly portray such a work as inspired by the regressive forces, we will be unwittingly helping those forces keep themselves in the shadows of many religious-intellectual souls. I don't think this second-order aspect of the current discussion has been much appreciated (which is obviously not to say we should silence all criticism, but we should at least patiently explore the vision of VT-MoT-Rodriel before publicly declaring 'what's going on').

So my view is pretty simple. We have work to do for lifetimes to come. Work, which does not depend on being a formal member of this or that church, and which is not entangled with its fate. If enough souls work seriously on the inversion and the Sun-tethering, then there will be conditions to bring new life to any institution. Or if the institution is not receptive to that life, a new form will be crystallized. But the three pillars are simply not something that can incite me to put all my confidence and energy in the Church-bride. Isn’t it fully plausible that, like some femme fatale, she may suck in all our energy, drain all our resources, and in the end say, “What made you think that I want to change and even support your project? Have you asked me?”

Probably, I’ll be accused of painting narrow-minded caricatures again, but these are real possibilities. It is a simple fact that we voluntarily unite the fate of humanity with the fate of an institution. All of that rests on our confidence (supported by no matter how many pillars) that this entity is going to change. And I don’t exclude that possibility, but in a sense, I prefer to be conservative. Yes, it may sound reversed, but when we come to know inner reality, our priorities are actually reversed. Now it is more secure, more certain, to work in accordance with the center that is not of this world. In comparison, the Catholic project looks more radical. It depends on more than one weak linkages in the chain. There are more vectors through which the project can be sabotaged by the adversaries.

Even though the discussion may sound as turning into strongly polarized camps, I don’t take it in that way. As said, I simply prefer to work within the domain of certainty, where I can give all my energy and motivation in a direction that I’m certain is what Christ intends, and the fruits of which will remain in value no matter how the more concrete details turn out. There’s so much work to be done! The Catholic project, on the other hand, demands that I invest energy in trying to devise ways to court the bride, to speak softly in her ear, to coax her, make many compromises, and at all times keep my fingers crossed that she wouldn’t at some point say, “Get lost.” I don’t see this as a divergence of paths at this time, because I know that both you and Rodriel will keep working on the high ideal. The only thing we do not share at this point is the vision that all life will revolve around the bride. I see that everything will revolve around the Living Christ in inner space and the Living Ecclesia, the Universal Brotherhood, and this activity will manifest in the most differentiated, yet synchronistic, ways across the World, even if they cannot be traced on the sensory-intellectual tableau to the 'fully connected graph' of a single institution. As long as this vision doesn’t deter us from working on the primary task, it’s all the same to me. But it will be sad if the obsession with the bride begins to demand too many compromises and one starts to lower the bar, just so that he can maintain a likable face before her.

There is something that feels missing here. I suppose it is the fact that, when you speak of "most differentiated, yet synchronistic" projects across the World, you are still imagining institutional brides into which your future energy will be invested. You may not be able to concretely envision or trace these brides yet, but they will eventually need to exist and you will eventually need to be invested in them, if the intimate work within the domain of certainty (another idea we find directly and continually emphasized in MoT) is to transform the practical fields of human affairs. There is simply no getting around that, even if we play the role of free-wheeling bachelor who refuses to be "tied down to a woman" for the time being. Eventually, we will all need to settle down and make the sacrificial commitment

So what is the riddle of the Church, how it will be transformed (or diffused, as you characterized it before)? What is its place within the spectrum of reality, and how do we give it more musical forms, or do you now feel that there is no place for it or possibility for taking more musical forms, and we (as those who seek the spiritual soul, in keeping with the times) should simply ignore it and let it fade away?

Honestly, I don’t know. If John maintains that he would never direct the Church, this means that it is left to Peter, that is, to faith-based intellect alone. In the new age, when human beings are expected to grow in true and deep self-knowledge and even discover the forces of evil within themselves, such a Peter-only Church will be the easiest prey. It is practically blind; it can be led by the nose. If John changes his view and realizes that the Church has any future only if enlightened human beings work within it, which effectively means that John should direct the Church, then the potential for transformation is great.

Agreed, and I think that what you call "John directing the Church" is what VT-Rodriel calls "John serving the Church". You will probably disagree, but I think there is a subtle confusion going on here. It makes more sense precisely when we begin to see things from an inverted perspective. The Biblical imagery is very instructive. Christ did not incarnate to directly command the Pharisees and Roman Emperors, providing a list of instructions telling what to do and what not do. His 'direction' of the Earthly world came through subtle messaging and self-sacrificial service. And I know that circumstances continue to evolve, that the subtle messaging must spiral together with explicit guidelines, but I don't see any way in which the initiates handing out directives and commands to World leadership will ever be the most fruitful way forward, especially now that the free and individualized spiritual soul is incubating. It will always need to be a more sacrificial, quiet, humble work from Unknown Friends.

[Federica]

The other interesting thing is that, if you understand Cleric's posts, you should be the one pushing back, because the critique applies directly to what you have suggested over and over again in recent threads, including the last few posts. The idea that Steiner's "core intention was rather for people to develop the right relationship to active thinking, with or without higher spiritual vision", is the most blatant way of preserving the intellectual soul indefinitely. Cleric says, "MoT provides a great way for souls to develop the right relationship to active thinking (and devotional feeling), but in the background of this work is the Catholic project, and this secretly acts as a way for the soul to indefinitely avoid seeking higher spiritual vision and letting go of its dependent grip on the fully traceable intellectual gestures." Yet this is also how you view the spiritual scientific project, and feel it is perfectly viable for souls to remain dependent on those gestures as long as they are developing the right relationship to active thinking. In that sense, the "Catholic project" that Cleric imagines is actually what you are advocating, while the Catholic project, as Rodriel has been trying to elucidate it (if we take him at his word and don't simply brush all nuanced indications aside), is something quite different.

Looks like you have still not checked GA 117.

What I have said - as a side note - is that for Steiner, in order for the Consciousness/Spiritual Soul to develop, it's more important to anchor the awareness of being there with one's I, in the thoughts, than to achieve clairvoyance. As Cleric presented in the DDF meditation, this is the way to create an anchoring point that allows the soul-spirit to find itself after death, and in subsequent reincarnations, hence to progress. This is granted by painstakingly developing active thinking and study-meditation by which the contents of SS are apprehended through the powers of thought. The first, initial measure of clear progression towards the Spiritual Soul (at rebirth, as I said, higher spiritual vision will inevitably come) is the application of the I-infused powers of thought to the revelations of the Spiritual Worlds shared by the Initiates in intelligible concepts. This is no blatant way to preserve the intellectual soul. Rather, it is the only way to facilitate the advent of the Spiritual Soul.

What you are describing is exactly how Cleric has described the Catholic project. Or, perhaps it is better to say, it is exactly how he has described what Tomberg was doing for a significant portion of his life, before he stalled out at a certain deepened and living thinking, yet still on 'this side' of the intellectual-imaginative threshold, the effect of which was his conversion to Catholicism and thus the project. He has also emphasized how study-meditation of MoT is greatly helpful for anchoring this experience of 'being there with one's I in the thoughts'. Yet he feels that, because the soul bumps up against the threshold and cannot progress to higher spiritual vision, it invariably begins to seek out physical-intellectual movements, organizations, causes, etc., and make these into the practical center of spiritual life, which ensures it can keep saying, "higher spiritual vision will inevitably come if I just keep doing what I am doing and let evolution take care of the rest". (and I practically agree with all of that, except the generalized application to VT, Rodriel, and the Church).

I don’t think so. What I’m describing from GA 117 approaches what Cleric referred to as the “pinhole, where we’re basically reduced to naked and alone thought-being in universal phenomenal space”. It’s the imprintable, markable, distinct experience of I-consciousness, of the self-contained ego, that is the door to the Spiritual soul (the upper triangle), without particular specification of the level of cognition.

Conversely, what Cleric described as Tomberg’s Hermeticism (and Hermeticism in general) is as you report: the Intellectual Soul’s highest supersensible experience (astral), aspiring to spiritual asymptotical (mystical) communion with the unfathomable one Logos. Hence the desire for an outer temple to shield the Divine unity from multiplicity, as if to tag the manifold Earth with a trace of its unified source (as if downwards from the pointy apex of the triangle which has not been opened upwards).

[Cleric]

Thanks, Cleric, all of this is very helpful to contemplate.

I am assuming you also appreciate, at least to some extent, that what you express above could be spoken in exactly the same way to someone who has dismissed the Catholic project (or any project that imagines the Universal Church will play an indispensable role in the future of humanity). As long as one does not automatically conceive of this project as a regression to the old world-policing, culture-sculpting, soul micro-managing, etc., medieval and early modern functions of the Church, then we could just as easily say, "we shouldn't act as if the Catholic project has offered us an investment plan with promises for a quick return..." We can speak about how VT has provided completely necessary attempts and hints for the potential shapes of this project (perhaps a better phrase than "subtle half-messaging"). We could speak about how, because of his attempts and hints, religious souls within the Church (even if very few, to begin with) can seriously contemplate and discuss the possibility of the Spirit entering through the sacramental life and radiating out into practical affairs. We can talk about how these things are still incubating without calling that "wishful thinking".

(I won't be able to address each of your points right now)

I keep saying that I make a big distinction between trying to awaken the souls within the Church and transforming the Church itself into the supposed future universal institution. The first doesn't of itself yield the second. I can only congratulate Rodriel for the efforts he's putting in with his Catholic friends. It will be a mistake not to do that when we have the opportunity. And MoT should most certainly be utilized for this.

However, I think everyone can feel it, it is different if we put on a kind of mold, which basically tells us, "unless what you do adds up to the edifice of the universal institution of the future, it is wasted effort". This already funnels our energies in a specific way, and thus, other tasks may be seen as unnecessary, or not seen at all.

I don't think I can express the way I see things any further than what I said in the post about the nighttime Ecclesia. The way I feel it is that more and more of the 'management' decisions (curving the streams of destiny) for guiding Earthly affairs will be taken outside of the body, in the symphony of the True Ecclesia of beings at all scales (in fact, such decisions are taken even now, except that incarnated human beings barely have their representatives there). We should make an effort to feel how the whole nature of human conduct should transform. Then, having purely sensory organization that aims to be universal is completely superfluous. Today, religious affiliations still carry external connotation. If I'm Catholic and I meet another person who says, "I'm Catholic too", I think to myself, "Good, he's one of ours." This is the kind of thinking that should completely dissolve as we move into the future. What matters then is not whether a person is Catholic but whether he has sacrificed his personal life for that of the True Ecclesia. What matters is if his soul unites with Ecclesiastic meetings in inner space and whether he is ready out of freedom and Love to carry the impulses into the sensory spectrum. Then, if two such people meet in the sensory world, it is completely irrelevant what labels they carry. What matters is if they participate in the same Great Work. What about the souls who are not yet capable to draw their impulses directly from the spiritual board? Don't they need some kind of Church that can guide them and explain the kinds of tasks that flow from above, and in which these souls can too freely participate? Yes, indeed that is needed. However, these Churches won't need to have sensory-bound wires that tie them into one formal organization with a single brand label. Every school, every workshop can be a Church, as long as the beings within it are part of the Living Ecclesia. Even if they don't explicitly synchronize their actions through physical channels, they would still act for the common Good, because they consciously draw from the same spiritual Source. This is not to say that the physical channels will be unnecessary, but I hope the point gets through. So you see, I'm not against the Catholic (Universal) Church - I simply see it on a higher level, where it is neither Roman, nor Orthodox, but the actual Life of Christ.

Agreed, and I think that what you call "John directing the Church" is what VT-Rodriel calls "John serving the Church". You will probably disagree, but I think there is a subtle confusion going on here. It makes more sense precisely when we begin to see things from an inverted perspective. The Biblical imagery is very instructive. Christ did not incarnate to directly command the Pharisees and Roman Emperors, providing a list of instructions telling what to do and what not do. His 'direction' of the Earthly world came through subtle messaging and self-sacrificial service. And I know that circumstances continue to evolve, that the subtle messaging must spiral together with explicit guidelines, but I don't see any way in which the initiates handing out directives and commands to World leadership will ever be the most fruitful way forward, especially now that the free and individualized spiritual soul is incubating. It will always need to be a more sacrificial, quiet, humble work from Unknown Friends.

This is connected with what I said above. If in the future, any kind of leadership doesn't draw its impulses from the Ecclesiastic meetings, then what would they be leading into? Realistically: how would decisions be made? In the far future, if the Peter Church is still intact, and John only 'serves' it, but Peter directs it fully autonomously, how do we picture this leadership? In the same way it happens today? Church officials gather, actions are proposed, they are voted on, and so on? I guess that the Church officials (if they are serious about it) would do all such gatherings as a ritual, where they first pray that the Holy Spirit can act through them. But in an age where it will be possible to make these gatherings in the supersensible, in the Living Ecclesia, why would the Peters still insist on doing them in the old-fashioned way, which was fully appropriate for the intellectual age? Isn't it the most natural thing that the leaders of the Church be Johns and draw the directing impulses from the spiritual world? What kind of forces would like to prevent this and keep the old-style decision-making and voting, where there's so much more leeway in which hidden forces can intervene?

It can be said that all of this is too fanciful because we might be millennia away from the time when human beings will be able to participate in the creative works outside of the body. Even if we are ten times more millennia away, we still need to have a clear sight on the ideal. Even the most insignificant action that we perform today should be made with a clear direction toward that ideal. Otherwise, we'll develop the pernicious habit of always saying "It's not yet the time." And in this way, the time will indeed never come. Even now, we should be fully conscious that if the Church is to perform any positive function, its direction should be drawn from the spiritual world. The Peter-Cardinals should have as their ideal to be John-Cardinals. Then, it will be indeed a fact that Johns will direct the Church. Not through their own intellectual decisions but by relaying the happenings of the Living Ecclesia. This would simply be a reflection of the far past, when the leaders have always been also the highest spiritual individuals, drawing the directing impulses through the old clairvoyance. Only later did the roles begin to split into the effective ruler and the spiritual advisor. Then, even further, the latter completely disappeared. So it's not surprising that in the future these things should be reversed. And by the way, at no point, ever since the physical incarnations began, has humanity been united as a single tribe, with singular spiritual rulership. We know that even in Atlantis there have been different groups of the Mercury mysteries, the Jupiter, the Sun mysteries, and so on. The different groups were taking in the spiritual impulses in specific ways. By the same token, we cannot expect that in the reflection there will be a point where the whole Earthly humanity will be completely externally united under a single Church, government, or whatever. Such a unity will be possible far later, in spiritual space, after the incarnations are over.

This sounds fantastic, but if it is not taken seriously, any attempt to save the Church will be wasteful. In the future, only that which draws upon the Source directly will be able to be saved. And this is why I'm concerned about the vision that sees the Church ruled through fifth-epoch consciousness, being projected all the way to the end.

[AshvinP]

Looks like you have still not checked GA 117.

What I have said - as a side note - is that for Steiner, in order for the Consciousness/Spiritual Soul to develop, it's more important to anchor the awareness of being there with one's I, in the thoughts, than to achieve clairvoyance. As Cleric presented in the DDF meditation, this is the way to create an anchoring point that allows the soul-spirit to find itself after death, and in subsequent reincarnations, hence to progress. This is granted by painstakingly developing active thinking and study-meditation by which the contents of SS are apprehended through the powers of thought. The first, initial measure of clear progression towards the Spiritual Soul (at rebirth, as I said, higher spiritual vision will inevitably come) is the application of the I-infused powers of thought to the revelations of the Spiritual Worlds shared by the Initiates in intelligible concepts. This is no blatant way to preserve the intellectual soul. Rather, it is the only way to facilitate the advent of the Spiritual Soul.

What you are describing is exactly how Cleric has described the Catholic project. Or, perhaps it is better to say, it is exactly how he has described what Tomberg was doing for a significant portion of his life, before he stalled out at a certain deepened and living thinking, yet still on 'this side' of the intellectual-imaginative threshold, the effect of which was his conversion to Catholicism and thus the project. He has also emphasized how study-meditation of MoT is greatly helpful for anchoring this experience of 'being there with one's I in the thoughts'. Yet he feels that, because the soul bumps up against the threshold and cannot progress to higher spiritual vision, it invariably begins to seek out physical-intellectual movements, organizations, causes, etc., and make these into the practical center of spiritual life, which ensures it can keep saying, "higher spiritual vision will inevitably come if I just keep doing what I am doing and let evolution take care of the rest". (and I practically agree with all of that, except the generalized application to VT, Rodriel, and the Church).

I don’t think so. What I’m describing from GA 117 approaches what Cleric referred to as the “pinhole, where we’re basically reduced to naked and alone thought-being in universal phenomenal space”. It’s the imprintable, markable, distinct experience of I-consciousness, of the self-contained ego, that is the door to the Spiritual soul (the upper triangle), without particular specification of the level of cognition.

Conversely, what Cleric described as Tomberg’s Hermeticism (and Hermeticism in general) is as you report: the Intellectual Soul’s highest supersensible experience (astral), aspiring to spiritual asymptotical (mystical) communion with the unfathomable one Logos. Hence the desire for an outer temple to shield the Divine unity from multiplicity, as if to tag the manifold Earth with a trace of its unified source (as if downwards from the pointy apex of the triangle which has not been opened upwards).

I suppose this is one of the reasons why I have issued a few cautions to Cleric on how these things are portrayed, precisely because this kind of confusion can result where it is imagined he is illustrating something specific to Hermeticism rather than the shared dynamics of any being that lives with their intellectual soul in astral space. These things quickly become like definitions for who is approaching the pinhole in the 'right way' and who in the 'wrong way', and of course, whichever way we prefer and are engaged in will be deemed the right way.

Thus, the spiritual scientist starts to feel comfortable because he/she does not 'believe' that everything above the astral asanas is nebulous mystical communion with the Logos. They have been exploring all kinds of communications about the hierarchies, spheres, and so on, which means they remain open to the multiplicity within the upper triangle, while the Hermeticist has closed down to it. This is fundamentally incorrect, in my view. The spiritual scientists who have received all these communications are no less likely to hesitate and turn back toward the relative safety and firmness of traceable intellectual representations, and perhaps are even more likely, because they now feel even more comfortable exploring the higher worlds through the detailed representations. These make the soul feel like it is gaining true insight into the lawful foundations of existence, and it quickly becomes satisfied with the expanding mental panorama. While the exclusive Hermeticist may consciously say "there is no reason for me to be open toward the upper triangle because the essential truths for development are all contained within the axiomatic basis of arcanic transformations", the spiritual scientist may say, "I am open to the upper triangle because I have studied all the detailed communications and brought my thought-being into universal phenomenal space, remaining ready and prepared," when in reality they are just as closed as the Hermeticist but have no basis to ever become aware of that (we can never become aware of a quality we lack if we believe we already posess it).

Of course, we know that is not how Steiner intended for souls to interact with his communications, yet we cannot simply smear over these realities, which history has also confirmed over the last 100 years. It is clear that the upper triangle practically doesn't exist for many spiritual scientists, and "Jupiter-Venus-Vulcan" may as well be mystical communion with the unfathomable Logos. You see, the moral dimension cultivated by the arcanic meditations of the Hermeticist serves a hidden function that, unfortunately, many spiritual scientists lack (although they wouldn't if they simply worked with KHW and MoT more). It is the function of cultivating humility and reverence in the face of the spiritual worlds, so even if we have gone astray in our initial orientation and have closed down to the upper triangle, we have a basis to resurrect our openness to higher spiritual vision when the opportunity presents itself. I think this is something very difficult to appreciate for those (like me) who have never been immersed in intense religious life. We don't clearly sense just how much our 'free spiritual striving' relies on the grace and faith of higher beings working within the subconscious layers of our soul life and helping to keep the latter open to their realities, if we have worked on purifying all that which obstructs these acts of grace from taking root within. This is one of the reasons why I am not nearly as pessimistic about the Catholic project as you and Cleric, and it doesn't seem this aspect of higher development has been appreciated.

[Federica]

Yes, this is what I am saying is already thoroughly understood, by both Rodriel and myself. The fact that free meditative life should increasingly become the center of our spiritual striving, and autonomous cultural streams will be the primary seat of this radiating meditative life, is understood. The fact that all institutions will become 'secondary', in the sense that we no longer rely on their explicit rules or teachings to know what and how to think, feel, and act, is also understood. It is understood that our inner life will, first and foremost, attain its orientation and impulses through direct communion with the spiritual beings that revolve around Christ. That is all understood, but it also remains as mere abstract principles unless we seek the concrete ways in which the institutions will fade, diffuse, transform, adopt different functions, or whatever the case may be, as the soul's center of coherence grows around the higher worlds.

I have always been of the view that there cannot be spiritual science, which is above all a transformative method of thinking through reality, without that concrete focus and exploration (just as Cleric expressed in the quote I shared before). Sometimes, such an exploration can serve as a mask, an intellectual rationalization exercise that seeks to justify an underlying disposition toward preserving the old ways of thinking-being, which is basically how Cleric sees the Catholic project. I am saying it is a fallacy to simply assume this is the only reason for such an exploration, and to assume this dynamic is not something that has already been contemplated (after all, it is something we become all too familiar with in our spiritual practice, as the soul life is experienced as being torn between the two spectrums of existence). I can be familiar with that dynamic but, at the same time, recognize that my phenomenological essays will not by themselves reach all souls or spiritualize the cultural landscape. I can recognize how other souls are presented with distinct and important, even critical, spiritual missions, and how this may implicate institutions that I have no particular affinity with or sympathy for.

Cleric has already addressed the above in great depth. Still, it’s interesting to notice how the more you immerse yourself in the Hermetic perspective, the more you become exoteric in your assumptions, as well as expectations, the more you are stuck within your institutionalized vision of the future, and the more you reinforce what “has always been my view that there cannot be spiritual science without the concrete ways” in which institutions will evolve. You call the alternative “mere abstract principles”, overlooking that they can’t be abstract principles since you yourself (as many others) have experienced them directly in the flow of becoming. And so you tell Cleric: “when you speak of "most differentiated, yet synchronistic" projects across the World, you are still imagining institutional brides into which your future energy will be invested”. No, you are.

And you assume that, in order for Cleric to grasp the essence of Tomberg’s soul, he needs to exoterically gobble Tomberg’s complete works, and reproach him: ”we should at least patiently explore the vision of VT-MoT-Rodriel before publicly declaring 'what's going on'." You ask him to physically guzzle Tomberg’s every word, whereas it’s you who haven’t digested the truth about the nature of Hermeticism, preferring to sip on a raw diet of fruity Hermetic juices, and now complaining that others do not get on that same diet, overlooking that VT's soul mouvements can be inquired much more directly than by exoterically getting on his diet. Not everyone needs to be on a given diet for ages in order to tell how it is deficient in some essential-for-the-times spiritual nourishments. But you don't seem to realize it.

I'll serve you some of your own past words, as an appropriate supplement to your Hermetic diet which promises the figure of the servant friend, the one who does not direct, but 'serves', the one who “does not have the somewhat puerile pretension of elevating oneself above the holy faith of the faithful, or above the fruits of the admirable efforts of workers in science, or above the creations of artistic genius.”

There is a real risk that we may start to confuse the preferences of our Earthly personality in the context of various tasks with the 'hues' of "higher intentions" (which is a risk we have often mentioned in the context of mystical seekers who imagine they have reached unconditioned 'pure consciousness' when folding up the intellect). We guard against such risks by being keenly aware of when we are still within the gravitational orbit of given karmic rhythms and when, in contrast, we are attaining escape velocity into a new kind of free work.

[Federica]

I suppose this is one of the reasons why I have issued a few cautions to Cleric on how these things are portrayed, precisely because this kind of confusion can result where it is imagined he is illustrating something specific to Hermeticism rather than the shared dynamics of any being that lives with their intellectual soul in astral space. These things quickly become like definitions for who is approaching the pinhole in the 'right way' and who in the 'wrong way', and of course, whichever way we prefer and are engaged in will be deemed the right way.

Thus, the spiritual scientist starts to feel comfortable because he/she does not 'believe' that everything above the astral asanas is nebulous mystical communion with the Logos. They have been exploring all kinds of communications about the hierarchies, spheres, and so on, which means they remain open to the multiplicity within the upper triangle, while the Hermeticist has closed down to it. This is fundamentally incorrect, in my view. The spiritual scientists who have received all these communications are no less likely to hesitate and turn back toward the relative safety and firmness of traceable intellectual representations, and perhaps are even more likely, because they now feel even more comfortable exploring the higher worlds through the detailed representations. These make the soul feel like it is gaining true insight into the lawful foundations of existence, and it quickly becomes satisfied with the expanding mental panorama. While the exclusive Hermeticist may consciously say "there is no reason for me to be open toward the upper triangle because the essential truths for development are all contained within the axiomatic basis of arcanic transformations", the spiritual scientist may say, "I am open to the upper triangle because I have studied all the detailed communications and brought my thought-being into universal phenomenal space, remaining ready and prepared," when in reality they are just as closed as the Hermeticist but have no basis to ever become aware of that (we can never become aware of a quality we lack if we believe we already posess it).

Of course, we know that is not how Steiner intended for souls to interact with his communications, yet we cannot simply smear over these realities, which history has also confirmed over the last 100 years. It is clear that the upper triangle practically doesn't exist for many spiritual scientists, and "Jupiter-Venus-Vulcan" may as well be mystical communion with the unfathomable Logos. You see, the moral dimension cultivated by the arcanic meditations of the Hermeticist serves a hidden function that, unfortunately, many spiritual scientists lack (although they wouldn't if they simply worked with KHW and MoT more). It is the function of cultivating humility and reverence in the face of the spiritual worlds, so even if we have gone astray in our initial orientation and have closed down to the upper triangle, we have a basis to resurrect our openness to higher spiritual vision when the opportunity presents itself. I think this is something very difficult to appreciate for those (like me) who have never been immersed in intense religious life. We don't clearly sense just how much our 'free spiritual striving' relies on the grace and faith of higher beings working within the subconscious layers of our soul life and helping to keep the latter open to their realities, if we have worked on purifying all that which obstructs these acts of grace from taking root within. This is one of the reasons why I am not nearly as pessimistic about the Catholic project as you and Cleric, and it doesn't seem this aspect of higher development has been appreciated.

Noone believes that Cleric's description is restricted to Hermeticism, Ashvin. And, please, stop arguing about the faults of Anthroposophists, we agree that many of them are not spiritual scientists. Nobody is saying that the arcana are useless or meaningless either. However, the important point is that Spiritual Science completes Hermeticism, but Hermeticism does not complete Spiritual Science - feelingly, cognitively and morally. The sense of humility and reverence you speak of is not the prerogative of Hermeticism and, most importantly, its cultivation leads away from - not towards - secret preferences or yearnings for the Catholic project, to the extent that it strengthen direct communion with that which is not of this world.

[AshvinP]

Thanks, Cleric, all of this is very helpful to contemplate.

I am assuming you also appreciate, at least to some extent, that what you express above could be spoken in exactly the same way to someone who has dismissed the Catholic project (or any project that imagines the Universal Church will play an indispensable role in the future of humanity). As long as one does not automatically conceive of this project as a regression to the old world-policing, culture-sculpting, soul micro-managing, etc., medieval and early modern functions of the Church, then we could just as easily say, "we shouldn't act as if the Catholic project has offered us an investment plan with promises for a quick return..." We can speak about how VT has provided completely necessary attempts and hints for the potential shapes of this project (perhaps a better phrase than "subtle half-messaging"). We could speak about how, because of his attempts and hints, religious souls within the Church (even if very few, to begin with) can seriously contemplate and discuss the possibility of the Spirit entering through the sacramental life and radiating out into practical affairs. We can talk about how these things are still incubating without calling that "wishful thinking".

(I won't be able to address each of your points right now)

I keep saying that I make a big distinction between trying to awaken the souls within the Church and transforming the Church itself into the supposed future universal institution. The first doesn't of itself yield the second. I can only congratulate Rodriel for the efforts he's putting in with his Catholic friends. It will be a mistake not to do that when we have the opportunity. And MoT should most certainly be utilized for this.

However, I think everyone can feel it, it is different if we put on a kind of mold, which basically tells us, "unless what you do adds up to the edifice of the universal institution of the future, it is wasted effort". This already funnels our energies in a specific way, and thus, other tasks may be seen as unnecessary, or not seen at all.

I don't think I can express the way I see things any further than what I said in the post about the nighttime Ecclesia. The way I feel it is that more and more of the 'management' decisions (curving the streams of destiny) for guiding Earthly affairs will be taken outside of the body, in the symphony of the True Ecclesia of beings at all scales (in fact, such decisions are taken even now, except that incarnated human beings barely have their representatives there). We should make an effort to feel how the whole nature of human conduct should transform. Then, having purely sensory organization that aims to be universal is completely superfluous. Today, religious affiliations still carry external connotation. If I'm Catholic and I meet another person who says, "I'm Catholic too", I think to myself, "Good, he's one of ours." This is the kind of thinking that should completely dissolve as we move into the future. What matters then is not whether a person is Catholic but whether he has sacrificed his personal life for that of the True Ecclesia. What matters is if his soul unites with Ecclesiastic meetings in inner space and whether he is ready out of freedom and Love to carry the impulses into the sensory spectrum. Then, if two such people meet in the sensory world, it is completely irrelevant what labels they carry. What matters is if they participate in the same Great Work. What about the souls who are not yet capable to draw their impulses directly from the spiritual board? Don't they need some kind of Church that can guide them and explain the kinds of tasks that flow from above, and in which these souls can too freely participate? Yes, indeed that is needed. However, these Churches won't need to have sensory-bound wires that tie them into one formal organization with a single brand label. Every school, every workshop can be a Church, as long as the beings within it are part of the Living Ecclesia. Even if they don't explicitly synchronize their actions through physical channels, they would still act for the common Good, because they consciously draw from the same spiritual Source. This is not to say that the physical channels will be unnecessary, but I hope the point gets through. So you see, I'm not against the Catholic (Universal) Church - I simply see it on a higher level, where it is neither Roman, nor Orthodox, but the actual Life of Christ.

Agreed, and I think that what you call "John directing the Church" is what VT-Rodriel calls "John serving the Church". You will probably disagree, but I think there is a subtle confusion going on here. It makes more sense precisely when we begin to see things from an inverted perspective. The Biblical imagery is very instructive. Christ did not incarnate to directly command the Pharisees and Roman Emperors, providing a list of instructions telling what to do and what not do. His 'direction' of the Earthly world came through subtle messaging and self-sacrificial service. And I know that circumstances continue to evolve, that the subtle messaging must spiral together with explicit guidelines, but I don't see any way in which the initiates handing out directives and commands to World leadership will ever be the most fruitful way forward, especially now that the free and individualized spiritual soul is incubating. It will always need to be a more sacrificial, quiet, humble work from Unknown Friends.

This is connected with what I said above. If in the future, any kind of leadership doesn't draw its impulses from the Ecclesiastic meetings, then what would they be leading into? Realistically: how would decisions be made? In the far future, if the Peter Church is still intact, and John only 'serves' it, but Peter directs it fully autonomously, how do we picture this leadership? In the same way it happens today? Church officials gather, actions are proposed, they are voted on, and so on? I guess that the Church officials (if they are serious about it) would do all such gatherings as a ritual, where they first pray that the Holy Spirit can act through them. But in an age where it will be possible to make these gatherings in the supersensible, in the Living Ecclesia, why would the Peters still insist on doing them in the old-fashioned way, which was fully appropriate for the intellectual age? Isn't it the most natural thing that the leaders of the Church be Johns and draw the directing impulses from the spiritual world? What kind of forces would like to prevent this and keep the old-style decision-making and voting, where there's so much more leeway in which hidden forces can intervene?

It can be said that all of this is too fanciful because we might be millennia away from the time when human beings will be able to participate in the creative works outside of the body. Even if we are ten times more millennia away, we still need to have a clear sight on the ideal. Even the most insignificant action that we perform today should be made with a clear direction toward that ideal. Otherwise, we'll develop the pernicious habit of always saying "It's not yet the time." And in this way, the time will indeed never come. Even now, we should be fully conscious that if the Church is to perform any positive function, its direction should be drawn from the spiritual world. The Peter-Cardinals should have as their ideal to be John-Cardinals. Then, it will be indeed a fact that Johns will direct the Church. Not through their own intellectual decisions but by relaying the happenings of the Living Ecclesia. This would simply be a reflection of the far past, when the leaders have always been also the highest spiritual individuals, drawing the directing impulses through the old clairvoyance. Only later did the roles begin to split into the effective ruler and the spiritual advisor. Then, even further, the latter completely disappeared. So it's not surprising that in the future these things should be reversed. And by the way, at no point, ever since the physical incarnations began, has humanity been united as a single tribe, with singular spiritual rulership. We know that even in Atlantis there have been different groups of the Mercury mysteries, the Jupiter, the Sun mysteries, and so on. The different groups were taking in the spiritual impulses in specific ways. By the same token, we cannot expect that in the reflection there will be a point where the whole Earthly humanity will be completely externally united under a single Church, government, or whatever. Such a unity will be possible far later, in spiritual space, after the incarnations are over.

This sounds fantastic, but if it is not taken seriously, any attempt to save the Church will be wasteful. In the future, only that which draws upon the Source directly will be able to be saved. And this is why I'm concerned about the vision that sees the Church ruled through fifth-epoch consciousness, being projected all the way to the end.

We all understand, to some significant extent, and choose to pursue, to the best of our ability, the living Ideal:

"More and more of the 'management' decisions (curving the streams of destiny) for guiding Earthly affairs will be taken outside of the body, in the symphony of the True Ecclesia of beings at all scales."

As I see it, the Catholic project can be characterized as the question, "How will this ideal of decisions drawn from the True Ecclesia practically come to fruition from within the Church? How do we, as Unknown Friends, chart a path from the current state of the Church (and thus of a significant portion of Western humanity) to the Ideal state?". It isn't a question of competing visions for the future, but it is a spiritual scientific question of how the shared Ideal will be best realized through the evolutionary conditions which are present and anticipated. Whenever this question is concretely explored, however, something strange happens.

To put it in a simple comparison, we can imagine that we are discussing how we strive toward the ideal of restoring the male-female unity. Some people begin to explore how a path can be charted from where we are now to this stage where physical reproduction, and therefore a stable family unit, ceases to be necessary. But then it is pointed out that the more one speaks about charting such a path, the more one must be indefinitely clinging on to physical reproduction and thus the institution of marriage - they must not be able to concretely imagine the approaching stage of male-female unity. Don't we know that there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, in Christ Jesus? This is a living supersensible reality, so why would we keep wasting time in the 'domain of institutional nuances' unless we secretly wish to cement marriage in its same traditional form forever? We had quite a few of these types of discussions with Eugene as well. Why mess around so much in the dualistic domain of facts when we know the ideal is Oneness, and we plunge into this Oneness after death? To make it even simpler, we could imagine someone telling us that the new age of consciousness has made it possible for us to explore the objective structure of reality and attain insights even during the night, when the physical sunlight is absent - we can 'see the Sun at midnight'! Why do we then still look with so much reverence at the physical Sun and chart its weaving course within the stellar spheres? Don't we see that we are only interested in the physical Sun because we want to trace the wires of all of our higher intuitions to this sensible manifestation?

Perhaps we can agree on another thing apart from the Ideal - if something like the Tombergian method of orienting to religious cult and dogma (think PoF-MoT-KHW) does not percolate (or continue to percolate) into the Church leadership and congregation over time, then it is 100% guaranteed that the Church will become exactly what you fear it could be, as you have described in all these posts. In that case, many souls within its orbit will become the unwitting puppets of unseen forces and will be practically lost for the ascending stream of evolution. I don't know, but maybe that can help develop a better appreciation for the perspective and vision of VT-Rodriel. It is a question of recognizing a deeper spiritual responsibility for doing whatever is within our power to spiral John and Peter together, given the dire circumstances we are faced with. We don't just send our well wishes to the Church faithful from afar and say, "Hey, if it works out for you guys, so much the better!", but we take it to heart that their fate, along with the fate of many others, depends on how we expand our interest in the phenomenal landscape and what we concretely invest our efforts into for its redemption.

Let's be clear, it's not that all the Johns and their autonomous streams will be forced to sign some pledge to devote their allegiance and all their efforts to making the Catholic project work, and that would obviously be opposed to the very spirit of the 'subtle and silent' work that has been described here. No one will be asked to sign their name in blood on a contract with the physical Sun. Yet that also doesn't automatically forbid these streams from expressing interest, reverence, and due deference to the Sun as needed. It is indeed about working toward a state where the rulers and spiritual advisers are brought back into a synchronistic and harmonious relationship, born out of higher spiritual vision. The spontaneous, synchronistic movements and the Church will co-exist and complement one another, as various planetary conjunctions with the Sun and constellations can highlight and amplify qualitatively distinct aspects of evolution.

We should also consider that there is such a thing as obstructing the possibilities of this project. Unfortunately, many esoteric organizations and souls within their orbits have become such an obstruction, because they can only imagine the distant horizon of the Church body becoming irrelevant and superfluous. Thus, all fellow Johns should be warned away from such a project and, if they begin pursuing it, we can only look upon them with the utmost suspicion. This lack of spiritual scientific exploration can have profound consequences. We forsake the opportunity to do spiritual science, to engage in true Divine white magic, in the name of defending and preserving it against the hopelessly backward institutions. VT was correct that "spiritual science" becomes a death mill in this sense, as one of the central phenomena of the Earthly landscape is considered a closed question.

We also cannot lightly ignore Steiner's indications and intentions toward the end of his life, when, in some interesting ways, his understanding of these things began to converge with VT. He saw that conditions were worsening more than anticipated, and spiritual science, as it manifested through Anthroposophy, was heading in a direction of intellectual fossilization and lacked the profound symbolic religious element. That is the basis for throwing his full support behind the CC as an independent endeavor, i.e., an endeavor that works distinctly from Anthroposophy. So far, it seems that very little attention has been paid to this fact. But let's provide another quote and see if it is given any consideration.

"We will have to talk about the question of the consciousness and unconsciousness and superconsciousness of a cult and a symbolism, which must indeed occupy our present time in the very deepest sense. For on the one hand we have the Catholic Church with its very powerful cult and its tremendously powerful and purposeful symbolism. What tremendous power lies in the sacrifice of the Mass alone, when it is performed as it is performed in the Catholic Church, that is, when it is performed with the consciousness of the faithful, which is present. And the sermon by the Catholic priest also has a content that relates to symbolism, and in particular it is very much imbued with will. [On the other hand,] the Protestant development of the last few centuries has led to the development of the cultus being transferred to the actual teaching content, to the teaching content. The teaching content is now that which tends to have an effect only when it is attuned to the understanding of the listener or reader. That is why Protestant churches face the danger of atomization, the danger that everyone forms their own church in their hearts, and precisely because of this no community can be formed. And this danger is one that must be countered.

We must have the possibility of forming a community, and one that is built not only on external institutions but on the soul and inner life. This means that we must be able to build a bridge between such a cult, such a ritual, that can exist in the face of modern consciousness and yet, like the Protestant confession, leads to a deeper understanding of the teaching.
...
This is really what we are striving for in the threefold social organism. The spiritual life we have today as a general rule — we are not talking about the other one — the spiritual life we have is not really a spiritual life, it is a mere intellectual life. We talk about the spirit, we have concepts, but concepts are not a living spirit. We must not only have the spirit in some form or other in the form of concepts that sit in our heads, but we must bring the spirit down to earth, it must be in the institutions, it must prevail between people. But we can only do that if we have an independent spiritual life, where we not only work out of concepts about the spirit, but work out of the spirit itself.

Now, of course, the Church has long endeavored to preserve this living spirit. It has long since disappeared from the schools; but we must bring it back there and also into the other institutions. The state cannot bring it in. That can only be brought in by what is at the same time individual priestly work and community work. But it must be priestly work in such a way that the priest, above all, has within himself the consciousness of an esoteric connection with the spiritual world itself, not merely with concepts about the spiritual world. "

Of course, Steiner also pointed to many anti-spiritual aspects of the modern RCC, the idea that Jesuits are interested in spreading materialistic thinking, and so on. Yes, these indications also need to be weighed and considered within the overall picture. The Catholic Project, however, is about not deeming it all a closed question from the beginning. It is about realizing that bridges need to be built and that the cultic-ritual element must play an indispensable role if there is to be any chance for an independent spiritual life for wide swaths of humanity, which draws them toward the Ideal of directing all Earthly affairs through higher insights. It's about charting a way in which the tremendously powerful and purposeful symbolism of the Church can be recruited toward this effort, which really means becoming more consciously engaged with how it was already fashioned by the True Ecclesia to contribute to the effort.

[Cleric]

...

I am in concord with what you say. And one of the reasons is that Rodriel’s vision goes further than what you focus on above, and it is that 'further' which rings dissonantly within me.

I don’t imply that we should get round the Church as a leprous dog. My only goal is to highlight what we are up to when we engage in this work. In a way, everything we know about the lower and the higher self, the personality and the individuality (in OMA’s terms), should be considered at this greater scale. That’s why I keep returning to the “John would never direct the Church. He only serves it.” We must read that as “The higher self would never direct the lower. He only serves it.” Obviously, if we take it this way, we’re headed into a catastrophe.

The Christ said he didn’t come to be served but to serve. I’m sure everyone knows how to understand this, but let’s make it explicit. It’s clear that this serving has nothing to do with satisfying the whims and tastes of humanity. Christ is doing the will of God, the higher intent. He is serving humanity in a way that humanity doesn’t even understand – people are after short-term satisfaction, they doesn’t realize the long-term Good that they are being bestowed with. That’s why, for some, the Love of Christ is a burning fire. It is very important to grasp this. To serve humanity in the proper sense means to serve the Divine in them, which they may not even be aware of.

This is pretty much the situation when applied to the Church. We’re clearly in an age where the Church is lagging. It now resembles the instinctive lower self, which has been shaped with great Wisdom (just like the body and instincts have been shaped with great Wisdom in the far past), but it is time that this body becomes subordinate in a directly spiritual way to the Living Christ. Which means nothing else but that the leaders of the Church must be Johns. This is also what I emphasized when I said that every school, every workshop can be a Church, as long as radiant beings work there – even if they have no formal affiliations with any of the official churches. This is the main thing. And it is confirmed by Steiner in the quote you provided: “But it must be priestly work in such a way that the priest, above all, has within himself the consciousness of an esoteric connection with the spiritual world itself, not merely with concepts about the spiritual world.” There’s simply no way around that.

The other thing is that we should loosen the idea of the RCC becoming the universal institution. When we delaminate the layers of our psyche sufficiently, we realize that such an idea can only be inspired in fifth-epoch consciousness. It can only be felt as necessary before a tipping point has been reached. Let me say it thus: as long as we feel like “I appreciate having your word on it, but a little contract signed with ink would be nice,” we’ll also feel that humanity is simply too slippery without a certain organization to oversee its form. All of this is bound to change with the inversion. Not globally, but starting from small societies enlivened by the High Ideal. And we can feel it even today if we go deep. Everything about contracts and formal memberships is fueled by fundamental mistrust between human beings. It was certainly indispensable, it still is, and will be for more time, but we simply distort our vision of the future if we secretly project this state far ahead, and even all the way to the Omega point. Why should people in the future be members of the same one Church? What does it even mean to be a member of that Church? Does one need to have a baptism certificate, a piece of paper with ink? RS, BD, OMA, have all been very clear about it.

Honesty, kindness, generosity, patience, peace, harmony and brotherhood will be the most highly esteemed values of the new life. Those who do not know how to manifest these virtues will be considered useless, even harmful. Diplomas will be awarded to those whose behaviour serves to bring peace and harmony, and not to those who are simply like a walking encyclopaedia.

Strong characters are needed to bring the kingdom of God to earth, not information services. In fact, real diplomas are awarded by nature, and nature alone. If the mere touch of your hand can bring relief to someone who is troubled and distressed, that is proof that heaven has awarded you a diploma. Do you possess a gift, a talent or a virtue? It is a diploma granted by the Lord. True diplomas are not pieces of paper; they are imprinted on your face and body – in the fibre of your whole being. You may well have all the diplomas in the world, but you would amount to nothing in the eyes of nature, unless you manifest the powerful and luminous emanations of a living diploma.

The whole physiognomy of man will reflect the inner being of man; he'll radiate like a sun. Pieces of paper, formal registration in a database – this would mean nothing. In this way, everyone who works in harmony with the invisible Ecclesia is a member of the One Church. Not because of a written certificate but because of their inner being, and the way they are embedded in the Cosmic flux. Then, even if a few groups of people work in different parts of the world and they do not even have physical contact, nor formal records in the same church database, as long as they have the luminous diploma, they are members of the One True Church on high – the Universal Brotherhood. We shouldn’t take this as some attempt to discredit the RCC. Quite the opposite, we need to be filled with joy when we feel how along the spiritual gradient we work on the same Grand Project, as members, or at least aspirants of the Universal Ecclesia.

With this in mind, we need the inner openness that communities will emerge ahead in time, which start directly with the application of the new impulses, afresh, unhindered, and thus wouldn’t need to first fight the inertia of the old. Of course, every member of that community is a source of such old inertia, but at least the ideal is immediately set high and without hindrances. Even today, it is encouraging to see how the spiritual scientific impulse is utilized in those who read BD, and vice versa. After a generation or two, souls become more sophisticated and can integrate these methods. My point is that there are great conditions to live this deepened life, with the needed sacred dimension. I prefer the word sacred, because religious and cultic are more loaded. As such, we should be prepared that such communities will unfold powerful individual and collective life, of which the Churches will need to take example. I say this again as a counterweight to the idea that the impulse has been planted into the RCC, and anything of value can only be expected to grow in that context. But ultimately, all such communities, whether new or old, will need to draw their life from the spiritual world. This is the invariant.

[AshvinP]

I will return to the other parts later, but to comment on this briefly:

This is also what I emphasized when I said that every school, every workshop can be a Church, as long as radiant beings work there – even if they have no formal affiliations with any of the official churches. This is the main thing. And it is confirmed by Steiner in the quote you provided: “But it must be priestly work in such a way that the priest, above all, has within himself the consciousness of an esoteric connection with the spiritual world itself, not merely with concepts about the spiritual world.” There’s simply no way around that.

But we know this is not quite the case, and if anything, Steiner's push for the CC shows how every school and every workshop cannot magically become a church, existing as an atomic unit, and each unit "forming their own church in their hearts". He said this atomization, which is already characteristic of Protestant religion, is a danger that needs to be countered. It seems this part of the quote wasn't considered. He continually suggests that, not just the sacred dimension in general, but that dimension as specifically revealed through the institution of cult and dogma, needs to be reintroduced within communities. This is the whole point of the CC, which needed to be established as something separate from Waldorf, biodynamic agriculture, medicine, etc., separate from 'every school and workshop'. Steiner continually references the sacraments, preaching, etc., of the Catholic Church as exemplifying how this new endeavor can move forward with a living, powerful, purposeful symbolic foundation. In that sense, the Church can indeed provide the example, which is not to say it cannot also learn from the examples of the autonomous streams. There is no reason for it be either/or, just like there is no reason for the head to only direct the heart or the heart to only direct the head. Our living organs work in symbiotic, reciprocal, mutually self-generating relationship with one another.

(of course, I am not implying we need to accept it because "Steiner said", but contemplating his indications can help stimulate our imagination to become a bit more flexible and expansive in this domain)