Thanks for stopping in, Paul. Yes, this was a lively discussion, with a wide variety of issues coming up.

You have an interesting perspective on the "big picture" and how the U.S. has received the baton, as it were, from the British. I'm not sure I agree completely, but there's plenty of room for historical analysis on those topics, which would probably be best served on another thread.

I think it's important to distinguish between Christianity, the Church, Christendom, etc. Christianity, as a message flowing from the life of Christ and gift of the Spirit, always transcends its historical and institutional manifestations. That the Church perennially falls short of living up to the implications of the message it is entrusted with is unavoidable, given fallen human nature; documenting these shortcomings can be helpful unto reformation, but when this is done to denigrate Christianity per se, there's something else going on.

FWIW, I don't see much of a connection between the wars in Europe in the 20th C and Christianity. How did Christianity influence German imperialism? Naziism? I just don't see it. There are other developmental forces at work involving the enlightenment, industrialization, and, as always, rotten political leaders preying on the fears of people. Again, another thread, if you're interested in purusing . . .

Popular Christianity is cultish and book-worshipping, and commercial Christianity vulgar, and thus the teachers of profound traditional spiritual wisdom of Christianity such as yourself strike many people as an extremely old-fashioned and vaguely suspicious.

As Tevia says in "Fiddler on the Roof," "It's not every day one receives a compliment like that."

My studies of Spiral Dynamics during the past year has taught me to be a little slower in judging popular expressions of religion, politics, etc. I suppose that for some people, fundamentalist Christianity really speaks to them and even gives them a better life than they would have otherwise. Perhaps this is the best they can do, or maybe it's the beginning of a journey that will lead them elsewhere. Stephen, on this web site, for example, is an outstanding example of a deeply spiritual and open-minded fundamentalist. I think most of them know the difference between God and the Bible.

What seems to be the case is that you and many others don't connect with fundamentalist, evangelical and televangelical Christianity. Then there's the Catholics' sex abuse scandals. I can understand the skepticism toward "organized religion," but I hope that one can see that without it, Christianity would have not spread throughout the world. And, yes, I think the world is much better off for it.

My intuition is that many more people will come to Christ through moderate, postmodern and relativistic-seeming spiritual teachings like Hawkins. They are a great improvement upon Ashtar Command.

Let me phrase it another way: Do you suppose Dr Hawkins' work a actual danger to Christian orthodoxy? And if it is not, then the it is quite possibly going to become a boon!

Hee hee. I miss Ashtar, at times!

I think Hawkins can help people who are turned off by organized religion to become more open to spirituality and even some of the great spiritual teachers of the ages. That it's all presented as something scientifically verifiable by AK will also attract some. Whether they will come to appreciate the wisdom that orthodox, classical Christianity has to offer is doubtful, however, Hawkins being too ecclectic and anti-intllectual to be able to make the necessary helpful distinctions. This all leads to New Age religion, which might be better than no religion at all, or maybe not . . .
- see http://heartlandspirituality.o...m/slideshows/newage/

. . . I have been listening to Allegri's Misere, the piece of music the Vatican held guarded for so many years from the masses. . .

I wasn't aware of that. Do you have a source for it? The Vatican has generally been supportive of the arts and of beauty being a leading toward God. E.g., their commissioning Michaelangelo and Rafael to pain in their chapels. The sacramental mentality in Catholicism has also encouraged great music in liturgy, artwork in churches, etc. So what you say sounds most out of character with what I know of Catholicism.