Perhaps we could discuss the idea of the soul joining the body in a womb.

In the early Church there were three ideas concering the origins of soul-body union:

(1) preexistence
(2) traducianism
(3) creationism

(1) Was developped by Origen and, perhaps, early Augustine, on the basis of Platonism. Plato taught that immortal souls, created by God at the beginning of time, dwell in a "place above heaven" where they behold the Truth. By various reasons they descend into bodies which clouds their consciousness and makes them forget the Truth. The process of knowledge is, therefore, anamnesis - remembering what the soul had seen before joining the body. Consequently, "salvation" is leaving the body and seeing the Truth again without hindrances.
Origen wrote that souls dwell in heaven with God, but they become sort of "bored" by this existence and they come down into the bodies.
Some scholars think Augustine shared this idea even writing "Confessions", where there's a lot of falling out from God and returning to Him metaphors, and the idea that we "remember" God as our ultimate fulfillment. Augustine says that we can desire only what we already know, so we have to have some sort of pre-knowledge of happiness, if we pursue happiness, as we obviously do.

(2) Traducianism was developped by Tertulian and this is an idea that the soul of the child is transmitted to him by his/her parents along with the body. That's why the original sin was thought to be transmitted directly by sexual intercourse.

(3) Creationism - late Augustine, e.g., is a theory that God Himself creates the soul at the moment of conception and joins it to the human cell that is growing in a womb. I always understood this doctrince as saying that there's no soul prior to conception.

Catholic Church teaches creationism, as far as I know. What are implications of this concept and what would be implications of preexistence?

My personal view is that there's no soul before the conception, so there's no remembering of anything prior to conception. I think there is a pre-knowledge of God because of our anthropological structure, but not "pre" in a temporal sense, like we saw God before we were in the body.
But after years of Platonism, I'm inclined to thomism - and maybe that's why. There's no person apart from ensouled body. The situation of the souls in heaven before resurrection seems to be an exceptional one, due to the consequences of original sin.

"The situation of the souls in heaven before resurrection seems to be an exceptional one, due to the consequences of original sin."


Can you elaborate on this a bit?

For me there is just the sense of not being able to know such things except vaguely; this is a true mystery. And I guess we all feel that way to some extent once we've given it our best efforts intuitively and intellectually. So we have to die to find out! I have my guesses, as we all do. And as I shared elsewhere, the NDEs, hospice work and dreams suggest a more Platonic picture. Aquinas' notion of creationism extends the bodily limit to post death disposition, and the NDE literature describes something different, although it isn't research dealing with truly departed souls. However, the visitations from dead family members - both my own and the reports we tend to read about - suggest a degree of autonomy that the Thomist notion doesn't support in terms of the soul's post-death life and activity.

We Catholics, and others, also recognize the communion of saints to be an active, dynamic relationship, where we pray to the saints for their prayers and interventions; this would seem to include everyone not in pergatory, and even then we pray for those in purgatory who can somehow respond. None of this speaks to what happens before or at conception, but the appearance of an heavenly world populated by the dead in varous ways seems more congruent with a pre-existence model of the soul, although a creationist model would fit as well. I suppose one aspect of the pre-existence model would be re-incarnation; it seems to go hand-in-hand with that notion, as far as I can see. And, personally I'd be surprised if there really isn't re-incarnation, but then there will be many surprises, no doubt!

As for original sin, I still see it operating even in a pre-existent model, but more along the lines of "karma," which isn't an official alternative for the orthodox Christian. But even without that, the state of original sin, if viewed from a pre-existent pov, would apply to souls created by God all at once who were affected by Adam's decision and come into the world through the filter of "flesh" during conception; their entry into the world isn't out of boredom, but for closer participation with those of us. That doesn't fit the biblical narrative as far as I read Genesis, but then I don't read it looking for literal associations, but only analogies. But if souls are pre-existent, then it seems they would participate not only in Adam's fallenness once incarnating, but in the fullness of the Second Adam's life in the heavenly realms, since Christ's work, from the heavenly pov, would be wrought Eternally before time.

We certainly come into the world with tendencies that can be described as sinful, inasmuch as we are prone to pride and fear, all signs of separation from God, none of which has to be taught. And so creationism is the simpler model and fits the more narrow "membership" requirements of orthodox Christian creed, at least in the Thomist way for how souls are considered more or less fixed at death in their basic disposition i.e, purgatory, heaven, hell.

But whatever the truth is will best in all ways, since it is God's doing and knowing!

If we take Immaculate Virgin as the vivid example of how human nature should be, were it not for the original sin, we see that she was transformed from one type of life in the body to another type of life in the body. She's never lost her embodiment. So maybe the separation of the soul from the body is caused by the original sin. If so, the state of the blessed without their bodies is a way to by-pass the problem. Augustine and others maintained from the beginning that the vision of God with the body is the perfect one, even though there's no "lack" in the beatific vision that share saints in heaven before resurrection. So that's why I suppose the "angelic" mode of the life of saints is not an end in itself.
But I share a view that the departed have contact with material world, and as Rahner suggested in a book that Phil found and gave link to some time ago, maybe the saints are related to this world without bonds of time and space. So they have their "personality" preserved by God and they can act in a personal way, that's for sure, also in my experience, but they're not whole persons, as we'll be after resurrection of the body.
I have to finish now, but I'll continue, when I get some more time.

I do agree with much of that, for what it's worth.

As for Mary, I have a kind of devotion to her, but not one shared by most Catholics at every point. So I suppose my Anglican/Episcopal early formative years come through on this. As for her having been without sin, intellectually I'm just not in agreement, any more than I'm persuaded she didn't have other biological children after the birth of Jesus. And I have, therefore, similar restraints regarding her Assumption. I can only take the church's sacred tradition so far, and at that point it strains credulity and biblical respect, for me. Not to say it isn't true, but I'm just not so sure as I need to be. And most well-respected Catholic biblical scholars, such as the late Raymond Brown, and John Meier, at least hedge on this from an academic pov, regardless of personal devotional beliefs.

But I am fond of your idea, where full embodiment of redeemed life is the perfection wrought by God, except that I would only refer to Christ as our exemplar in this. And the notion of departed souls held by God and graced with power for interaction with us on earth is necessary for the communion of saints.

On that note, when I see the dead in my dreams (or am under that impression), they are embodied in quite a beautiful way; radiant-like bodies, more body than energy or spirit, at least in appearance. Perhaps that is just for us, if it isn't pure imagination.

It's interesting that in my encounters with the saints (Ignatius, Francis, Joseph, STA) I never see anything body-like. I just feel and know their presence along with a certain pattern of energy which I feel in my own astral body in a peculiar way. I thought it's because they haven't bodies, they commune with me via kundalini, giving me very vivid impression of their presence and of a sort of "mind-to-mind" conversation, if you know what I mean.

I saw "body" of Virgin Mary in several visions, but I think of it more in terms of how she appears to me, not how she really looks like in heaven. The same with Jesus. Visions are not real apparitions - neither Jesus, nor Mary are seen on earth after they entered heaven.

It's interesting what you write about the departed. But maybe it's a way they show to you (to us), not the way they really are? I always have this epistemological doubt about our experiences - they are filtered through us, so even in contemplative graces I don't feel I see God how he really is, but only how he lets me experience Him.

Strange how our experiences are dependent, possibly, on our beliefs - the fact that I don't see the blessed in a bodily form, and the fact that you see them in your dreams with bodily appearences...

As for the notion of reincarnation . . . . I have wondered if the soul, in it's apparent bodily like state post-death (only trusting my dreams and other accounts), isn't an indication of how the earthly body is formed, with the soul a template, but yet which is to some degree shaped via our life experiences. The people I see who are dead are clearly recognizable, but wiser, more loving, and their faces and bodies show this. The conflict of course is how this suggests the body is just a vehicle, tossed aside, and then another developed through another birth that carries many of the characteristics of the soul which enshrines the lessons of the previous life-time. So from that pov, there are many bodies, but really only one continuum of embodiment through which the soul learns, awakens, responds to Grace, etc . . . .

But a version of "karma" might be permissable from a more orthodox Christian pov if we just think of this as what the soul engages when incarnated as its function within the Body of Christ, all of us with various limitations, strengths, lessons to learn. That wouldn't require many lifetimes, and could be described from the creationist pov.

Yes, I feel we filter their presence, and they are quite willing to make contact with us based upon that peculiarity. In prayer, where contemplation is given, there is little seen in my experience. Sometimes the "prayer of quiet" leads to visions, but once touched by Him, there is little of the mind in operation to form these impressions, although it can wander a bit, whereas the will is taken up and held.

Mary has appeared in bodily form, in an apparition, walking across a verdant hill, with flowers blooming as her feet touched the ground. There were words: "The Mother of God leads the way." So I'm probably more Catholic than I think I am, as she was truly full of love. I've shared that somewhere else before.

There were a few others where there was only a presence and some words, similar to how you describe, with no apparition.

So who knows . . . . . they do!

Wow, there's been lots of good discussion today. Where was I? Oh, yeah . . . a SpiritLife workshop day at the retreat center. Where to jump in?

quote:

The people I see who are dead are clearly recognizable, but wiser, more loving, and their faces and bodies show this. The conflict of course is how this suggests the body is just a vehicle, tossed aside, and then another developed through another birth that carries many of the characteristics of the soul which enshrines the lessons of the previous life-time. So from that pov, there are many bodies, but really only one continuum of embodiment through which the soul learns, awakens, responds to Grace, etc . . . .

w.c. I see that you and Mt have acknowledged that these perceptions of yours might be how your consciousness is symbolizing these various presences, as we don't really know how to envision presence without recognizable forms. And yet you may be given to see things as they really are . . . that the body is naught but the physical manifestation of the soul in space and time. I, too, suspect that the soul "looks" like our bodily form and is its template; that's not too different from the Thomistic idea of the soul being "the form of the body." The body ages and dies, why we don't completely understand, but it's surely got something to do with original sin (whole other discussion). I suspect, too, that its disembodied appearance manifests the virtues and sins its developed in this life.

One thing to keep in mind, here, is the implications of the Resurrection. There's just nothing to suggest reincarnation nor the need for it. I do believe Jesus would have taught about this had it been important for us to know of it. People like Origen speculated on it, but it was rejected because it was deemed unnecessary for salvation, and it was also a bit of a metaphysical difficulty to reconcile with the implications of the Resurrection.

Re. pre-existence. The Church has formally rejected "pre-existentianism," but there are various versions of this, some of which could well be orthodox. The idea that souls fall from grace and so become embodied is, of course, loathsome, as it views embodiment as a punishment. But we can say that God has always known that we would exist and so we have always existed in some manner in God's eternity. Just what this manner of existence is, however, is impossible to know for sure.

If Christ is our model, than we can ask - if He reincarnate? Rather not. His personality, his individuality was so special and powerful, that it's not possible that his individuality was incarnating more than one. The same with his resurrection - his body, soul and spirit, along with the Eternal Word, was brought to eternal life, and this was ultimate fulfillment. He is the New Adam.

I don't think that the soul of Jesus existed before the Conception. It would be contrary to the Mary's fiat. She had a choice, and on that choice dependent salvation through Jesus. When she said "yes", she immediately conceived in the Holy Spirit. If the soul of Jesus existed before the Conception, than it would be odd - God-Human without a body would exist before Mary said "yes" and before he "became flesh". So the history of Jesus, as it seems to me, leaves no space for pre-existence, for reincarnation, for disembodied human spirit. Why all the others should share such fate as preexistence, reincarnation, subtle immaterial bodies etc., while the New Adam - didn't?

What are for you the spiritual advantages for asserting reincarnation or pre-existence? In what ways it is "better" spiritually than the Thomistic, mainstream views?

So all of this occurs in a paradoxical way for us on earth, as these salvific events, including Mary's "yes," were present in Eternity prior to their manifestation from our perspective, including the Second Person's conception as Jesus. Of course, if souls pre-exist and re-incarnate, then this too is already complete Eternally. Christ's soul was perfected both as without Adam's tainting in conception, and via his life, death, resurrection and ascension, as you said. In some way all events of creation are present Eternally in the Trinity; this isn't really an agrument for pre-existence of souls, since any event, regardless of how it occurs, must be present Eternally, including all our choices, even to the extent they are free. And by virtue of His complete and perfect Life, Christ wouldn't have re-incarnated, if we use the incomplete life as a criteria for the notion of re-incarnation. These incomplete lives, lived many times, can be present in Eternity as one continuum as well, assuming for this thread that re-incarnation occurs. Creating souls before conception is also subject to the Eternal "condition" as much as any other scenario.

So are you saying the soul of Jesus as conceived fully in His incarnation existed Eternally as an indication of the creationist state of all souls? From the pov of Eternity, as I can only imagine it, all events must be complete already, regardless of their ordering in time. But as for a baby, which was how we first started talking about this on another thread, I suppose the sense of God's presence could be as equally impressive in the oceanic conditions of the womb as in some heavenly realm-like bus station.

I'm left with this, among other things: if re-incarnation occurs via the model of pre-existence of souls, then those souls would be known as both perfect, tainted, redeemed and completed all at once Eternally, and so their presence in the heavenly realms would be permissable theologically and ontologically, I think, at least as we're considering it. As Phil said, re-incarnation isn't necessary to expalin anything theologically; rather, the impression of souls still learning, growing, after death, in contrast to the pure Thomist notion, suggests pre-existence, since Thomists see the soul both beginning and ending its growth with conception and at death where the bodily resurrection awaits. But if souls experience themselves as such, in Purgatory for instance, then there are realms of heaven not fully participating in the Eternal pov, it seems, even though Eternally all is complete already.

So it seems like Eternity would entail all things concurrently in either of those models. The creationist model suggests that once dead, souls remain imperfect in some way yet alive to Christ as Paul alludes (one of the letters to the Corinthians, I think); yet, if they are not only upheld Eternally metaphysically, but living that way in their own awareness, this would include their resurrected body, as nothing is incomplete from within Eternity. I wonder about this because these apparitions, or visions, which present in radiantly bodied way, seem both to allow for growth in holiness and to be complete already. And I do wonder if there are realms where departed souls don't completely experience themselves from an Eternal pov, except as knowledge given by God as we occasionally experience in the graced-touch of contemplation.

Wonder, wonder, wonder. At least it "proves" consciousness and the Divine aren't the same!

This message has been edited. Last edited by: w.c.,

Well, these are deep waters, albeit highly theoretical. My understanding of creatures' pre-existence in Eternity is that they are something like "thoughts" in the mind of an artist, but they don't become real beings until they actually assume existence in space and time. This would apply to human souls as well, of course. It has a real beginning with conception . . . is no longer simply an idea in the mind of God, but now an expression of God's creative genius, and a co-creator of its own destiny.

In referring to Jesus example in my post above, I should have mentioned that we do have more than the resurrection to go on. He teaches on "the final things" on several occasions, and there's never even a hint of reincarnation informing his perspective. Rather, it's death and then judgment, with two possibilities, heaven and hell. Purgatory isn't really a third option so much as a preparation for heaven.

I think of this life as something of a "larval stage," which is hardly a unique idea, I realize. But if that is so then the growth in wisdom and experience that reincarnation supposedly makes possible can seemingly happen as one continues to grow in the afterlife. For Christianity, however, the primary emphasis has been to establish souls in connection with Christ, that we might live with Him after death. Just how things go from there, we don't know, but it would seem that if one dies in Christ, there would be no further need for rebirth (at least not for purposes of salvation) and, most likely, no need for additional experiences in this world as well.

One aspect of the Christian teaching not mentioned thus far is the general resurrection, where we are once again clothed with a new, resurrected body. There is no question then of imperfection of deformity. As Revelations affirms, "Behold, I make all things new." Just what kind of body we have between now and then is a mystery, of course. We might think of the soul as a kind of spiritual body, and the Church teaches that we are capable of enjoying the Beatific Vision even in this intermediate state. That all gives me hope. I think I'd be disappointed if I were to die and discover that I'd have to be reincarnated again, but that's an emotional response, I know. In the end, I think we don't know much about what comes next, and maybe that's for the best.

Yes, and there are passages in Julian of Norwich's "Shewings" which comfort us in this.

But on the subject, there are principalities and powers, angels, Paul's third heaven, Jesus' reference to children all having guardian angels seeing the face of God, etc . . . dinizens of the heavenly world - and seemingly far more unfallen than fallen - that are already manifest in their own forms, but not bodily as we know it. I suppose you might say that once conceived, the human soul in death then passes on to some aspect of this world, remaining incomplete until the general resurrection, but forming the "community of saints" as souls redeemed and still active in relation to those who haven't yet died. So there's a place for the soul, which Paul yearns for (to be with Christ and away from the body, an earthly tent - 2nd Corinthians 5: 1-10), leaving one to wonder - as we only can - about its state prior: immediately conceived as physically embodied (and therfore immediately fallen), or partaking of the unfallen heavenly realms prior to incarnation. The soul in the latter scenario wouldn't be fallen until embodied by God into this world, I suppose. That would probably be quiet heretical, and an old heresy at that, although I'm not sure which one! But there is something about a baby, which I've called the imprint of "Thou-ness," which suggests a pre-existence in the heavenly realms.

And there's this bit of scripture which might hint at the pre-existence of the soul as substantial as Paul's allusion to being away from the body:

"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you. I have appointed you a prophet to the nations (Jeremiah 1:5)."

Dear gentlemen: I've wondered about that passage in Jeremiah that w.c. brings up. Whatever it means, I think Phil's idea about thoughts in the mind of an artist seems like a good possibility. I know as a sculptor I have a nearly concrete, almost tangible, image in my mind of the finished piece before I start; yet the completed work itself is at the same time a surprise to me.

Ariel, that's how it goes with books as well. Stetching the analogy (a lot), one might think of the Big Bang as the beginning of God's creative expression, carried out over the aeons. Anyway, that's all in the creationist paradigm -- creation as "made," not begotten.

w.c., yes, it's been my understanding, too, that the "denizens of heaven" reported by Paul and Revelations are probably angels, the souls of redeemed, deceased humans, and perhaps unfallen or redeemed beings from other planets. I'm not sure about the orthodoxy of the version of pre-existenianism you're proposing above, as the dominant Catholic teaching (not sure what Protestantism proposes, here) is that God creates the soul at the moment of conception, and so it has no actual existence prior to this (foreknowledge not being a form of existence). See http://tinyurl.com/lv429o (then skip over to p. 122) for a good discussion of this topic, which is extremely relevant to the topic of abortion.

This discussion brings to my mind Peter Singer and other like-minded teachers--people I'm more comfortable forgetting about. Singer is the bioethics professor at Princeton who's been named among the "100 most influential people of our day" by TIME magazine as well as being called "the most famous living philosopher" by The New Yorker.

As many of you probably know, Singer considers infanticide to be morally just up to 30 days from birth--by his theory, for both healthy and disabled infants. The new parents have a month to decide if they really want that particular baby.

Whether or not pre-existence explains it --who really knows?-- w.c.'s account of his recognition of "Thou-ness" in his friend's baby is something that I strongly wish Singer and others were open to hearing.

Phil: I think the word translated as "workmanship" (Greek poema)in Ephesians 2:10 usually refers to spoken works of art, right?:

"We are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do."

So I guess your experience of writing would show a facet of God's creativity. I think He likes to work "hands-on" as a sculptor, too.

On a rather different note (npi) than this thread but related to the creative Word, the very pretty song "What Do I Know of Holy" by Addison Road has this line, "What do I know of You, who spoke me into motion..." that I often remember throughout the day. (The song should be available on youtube or as a free download somewhere.) It's a not quite apophatic, I guess, (new word for me ) prayer beautifully set to music.

Thanks for the song reference, Ariel. I'm not familiar with that one. And, for sure, sculpting is creative expression analogous to God's handiwork.

Re. Peter Singer . . . his position on infanticide is extreme, and impossible to justify from a Christian perspective. We've had several extensive discussions of abortion on this board and no one's ever defended infanticide as morally justifiable. The book I referred to in my post above has an extensive discussion of the history of "ensoulment" in Christianity, and no one has proposed that this takes place after birth. The minority position has been that it occurs after 40 days (for men, 90 for women! ) but that was following Aristotle's deficient biological assumptions. The dominant position in all of Christianity has been that ensoulment happens at the moment of conception. This doesn't resolve the (thread-topic) of pre-existence, as a pre-existing or re-incarnating soul could become embodied at conception as well.

Here's another link that considers pre-existentianism and other related topics.
- http://tinyurl.com/n44mrb

It seems that in all of these arguments against pre-existentianism, the major objection is that it at least implicitly fails to affirm human individuality as body/soul, making the soul, instead, the true basis of our humanity. The common New Age saying that we are "spiritual beings having a human experience" would be an outcome of a pre-existentianistic or trans-migration viewpoint; the "spiritual being" in question might not even be a human soul such as we understand it in Christianity. This makes of the body something of a four-dimensional space-suit for a spirit to get around on planet Earth. That's all way off the Christian metaphysical map. w.c. has articulated above some possibilities that might be orthodox, but I don't know that they'll catch on. I'm not sure, either, why the "thou-ness" we see in infants suggests pre-existence, as the innate subjectivity of a soul and its unrealized potential suffices (for me) to explain its open, mysterious gaze.

Phil:

Perhaps I'm naively enamored with what I see, not being a parent. As I said, infants not only exhibit subjectivity, but their look suggests early on they've been seen rather deeply. Now that is itself a quality of subjectivity, but would we say subjectivity is even possible without having been seen deeply? I meet homeless people who haven't been seen, or haven't wanted to be seen, for perhaps a long time, and much of that subjectivity is occluded (although still lurking). And so I'm suggesting that the soul is present to God, or angels, the heavenly realms, before conception; however, this leaves us with the issue of time-collapse, since any point in that realm of grace might be understood as singular, whether at conception or before, all together one supernatural gesture. I'm left wondering if there isn't a form of time, and space, at work in certain heavenly realms which locate the growth of the soul, such that true saints are closer to timeless union than those whose lives have lacked such rare sanctification on earth. And yes, we can say that apparitions must account for our nervous systems, but then the stage-craft is so good I'd swear the dead really do inhabit a rich dimensional world.

quote:

Now that is itself a quality of subjectivity, but would we say subjectivity is even possible without having been seen deeply?

That seems to be the premise upon which your hypothesis is based, and I honestly don't know the answer. Why cannot the infant's being deeply seen by God after conception account for the quality of subjectivity you see?

I must confess, too, that most of the time it seems to me that the gaze of infants often seems a blank stare showing little evidence of personality or intelligence. I've given many a bottle and looked into those little eyes, which seemed to just be staring out in space. They can't really focus for a few weeks, so they're much more attuned to touch and sound and intensities of light, in general. After a month or so, things start to get better. Truly, that first month or so has seemed to me like taking care of a little animal moreso than interacting with a person. When their responsiveness improves, it's a whole other story.

I'm wondering what others have experienced with infants. Fwiw, my wife would say pretty much the same as I have.

Your other points seem metaphysically interesting, but you're in uncharted waters, you know.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
Re. pre-existence. The Church has formally rejected "pre-existentianism," but there are various versions of this, some of which could well be orthodox.

I like the line from the prayer Hail Holy Queen that goes, "After this, our exile, show unto us the Blessed Fruit of thy womb, Jesus."

That implies that our time on earth is an "exile" from our normal condition, as does the parable of the prodigal son.

Yes, but for the record - before I'm lampooned and cast in shame from the thread! - I'm remembering my friends kids "early on," which is the first half year, maybe as late as eight months. But then there's plenty of human mirroring going on by then. Maybe it was gas . . . . .

But as we hold to the existence of the human person, in essence, from conception, we're saying a lot already, as in relational awareness. So even if personness arises with the creation of the soul at conception, there is implied something rather intimate beyond the human domain already at work.

When people find out I'm Albanian, they often remark, "Oh, like Mother Teresa."

In response, I have often said, "Yeah, before I was born, I told God that if He was going to send me to this crazy planet to live, that He must make me the same gender, nationality, and religion as the most holy person alive."

Small bit of "evidence" for pre-existentianism or just my fantasy of grandiosity /omnipotence

Ha, good one, Shasha!

I guess everyone now knows how to spell pre-existentianism, right? We just might get more hits on this topic than any other site on the net.

-----

From w.c.

quote:

I'm remembering my friends kids "early on," which is the first half year, maybe as late as eight months. But then there's plenty of human mirroring going on by then. Maybe it was gas . . . . .

In you or the baby? But, wow . . . yeah: eight months is a huge difference from infants in the first couple of months. By eight months they've experienced hundreds of hours of gazing trustingly in their parents eyes, usually while nursing or taking a bottle, but also during diaper changes and play times. If that gaze hasn't been met with loving presence, they will experience a deep mistrust in the basic goodness of life.

Well, I can see only hours left for me on this thread, or the direction it has taken. Accused of gas . . . . probably should have happened a long time ago.

There is some good research on measures of consciousness and memory in the unborn child which go right along with the Christian orthodox view of the human person. And I say this data at least indirectly supports the notion which would follow from personhood: relational awareness already active. IOW, memory means nothing unless it is already formative in terms of the person as a real identity seeking to understand her environment, even when the differentiation in the first weeks is so limited. So I'm not sure how to imagine this capacity for memory and orientation to the mother's voice, messages conveyed hormonally, in strictly survival terms when it carries such existential meaning for both of them. How could such an exquistely sensitive organism/person not notice Divine presence when its windows of primal perception are as unobstructed as possible? The fine tuning appears early in the embryo (second month), and since we are literal in our regard for the embryo being a person, such a wealth of environmental influence and cellular transformation must register in the deeper regions of the soul. We know how near God is, and being upheld and fashioned in the womb couldn't completely escape the neonate. And so even though reflective memory, in a conscious way, may not characterize the child until the last tri-mester (the research seems to be dating that earlier and earlier), I'd guess the ability to feel love, even in various shades, is acutely fine-tuned, since the mother's hormonal and energetic messages have few filters. And we also have to reckon with the research showing the heart, stomach and intestines to have their own nervous systems, developed far earlier than the cerebral cortex.

So if I'm making a case at all for personhood in a certain sense (the imprint of "Thou-ness, a fading but initially welcome concept ), the evidence also supports the unborn's intimate relationship with the mother and even others close to her. So the mirroring may begin before there are visible signs, as the research seems to support. Unwanted children, shunned emotionally but not aborted, appeared in one study to die about 2.4 times more often than wanted children, per what Thomas Verny reports in his book "Pre-Parenting: Nurturing Your Child from Conception," a book which is a welcome relief to the attempts to manipulate fetal I.Q., as though pre-kindergarten weren't bad enough.

So I'll share a bit more gas . . . .

When my friend's first child was about three years old, and awaiting the birth of her sister, I asked her if she remembered what it felt like when she was inside her mother (I shared this somewhere before. Too many years on Shalom . . . .). She paused a moment in the middle of playing and said, "I was swimming. There was lots of room, but then it was crowded and I got scared." Yes, this child was quite verbal early on, and her parents had never asked her such questions. It appears the age of three is a ripe time period for such revelations, i.e, most children are verbal/cognitive enough, but still living in a more embodied, heart-centered way.

Now this will really turn up the gas meter. So nobody light a match in cyberspace, or you might lose your hard drive . . . . .

I just perused Verny's book, and found this anecdote, for the first time (lights a cigarette . . . . ):

"Another mother wrote me than one day, sitting around the dining room table, she'd joke about the pajamas she'd frequently worn while pregnant with her little girl. 'Do you remember those pajamas?" the child was facetiously asked. "I couldn't see what you were wearing. I could only hear what you were saying."

'What was it like?' the mother asked.
"It was dark and crowded like a big bowl of water,' the child said.

'What was your favorite food?' asked the mother.
'I didn't get any food," replied the daughter.
"What did you think when you were born?'
"It wasn't crowed anymore," said the girl. "I could finally stretch."

My friend's daugther's report of fear was consistent with a complicated and prolonged delivery.


Off to the men's room . . . . . .

Good writing, and good topic, w.c. I'll have to remember to ask my grandkids if they remember what it was like before they were born. I never thought to ask my own children that question.