Taking the Supernatural with a Grain of Salt

I was raised in the Judeo-Christian tradition, so I have some familiarity with the prophets of the Old Testament. Additionally, I have had some exposure to New Agers, Wiccans, and other modern day believers in psychic phenomena. Let me say, for the record, that I believe in psychic phenomena, but I differ from many other people because I ascribe no religious significance to said phenomena. The following discussion is intended to explain why.

Let's begin with the Virgin Mary. Over the last few centuries she's appeared to a number of people to make prophecies, remind the world that if we don't do as we are told, we're all going to burn in Hell, etc... Over the years she's made a number of predictions, some of which have come true. For example, I believe she accurately predicted World War I and World War II, as well as the rise and fall of communism. However, remember that God being God, He's perfect and therefore never wrong. And supposedly, he is the source behind the Virgin Mary's prophecies. In 1985, the Virgin Mary appeared in Ireland and said "God is angry with the world. Unless the world improves ten-fold in ten years, God is going to destroy it." Let's see. 1985 + 10 = 1995. That would be the deadline. How many people think that the world has improved ten-fold since 1985, particularly from the Christian perspective? I certainly don't. I'm sure it is not easy to measure the spiritual meter of the entire world, but I think a ten-fold improvement is a bit much to expect. It is now 2008, thirteen years past the deadline. Apparently, the Virgin Mary was wrong. Well, she was right about WW I and WW II and communism! That's fascinating, I'm sure, but it only takes one mistake to prove you are not God (or, in this case, the source of your information is not Divine). That's it. One mistake. There are no second chances to prove you are God.

Keeping that in mind, let's make a few comments concerning religion, prophets, psychics, messiahs, christs, and Sons of God. I'm inclined to group them all together under one heading called "The Voice from Beyond." Of course, the religious will say, "Ahh, but there's a difference between a psychic and a prophet. A prophet is inspired by God, and a psychic gets their information from spirits... it's sorcery." To me, however, it's the same thing. It's "The Voice from Beyond." And, I would love to understand the mechanism to distinguish between a psychic and a so-called prophet.

Let's look at the "Voice from Beyond" in a historical context and do some comparisons. According to "The Voice from Beyond" in the Judeo-Christian tradition, that is, "The Voice from Beyond" of 2000 plus years ago, there is this horrible bad place called Hell and if you are a bad person, your soul will be condemned there for all eternity. Fast forward, 2000 years to the present day. We have the New Agers. According to them, "The Voice from Beyond" tells us that there really is no Hell. According to them, if you die and find yourself in a Hell, that is really an illusion; it is a manifestation of the Astral Plane brought about by your expectations, beliefs, whatever... but in the end, it is an illusion, and when you realize this you will be free of it. Hmmm. At one point in time/history the "Voice from Beyond" tells me there is this horrible place called Hell where all sinners are damned for eternity. At another point in time, the "Voice from Beyond" says there is no Hell. It's all in your head. Perhaps, the New Agers are being deceived by Satan: there really is a Hell, they are lost, they are being deceived, and they will all wind up in Hell. Well, I'm inclined to think (of my own accord, without help from "The Voice from Beyond.") that condemning a soul to be tortured for all eternity doesn't do anyone any good. A God that rules through fear, isn't much of a God to me. After several thousand years, humanity has learned that justice does not involve torturing criminals for their crimes. Segregation, perhaps, maybe even rehabilitation when possible... but torture? Not even proponents of the death penalty believed that murderers should be skinned-alive for their crimes. Ahh, so the New Agers are right. So we should listen to them! Not so fast. The New Agers have a hideous problem on their hands. Remember God is perfect... he's never wrong. If there is, in fact, no Hell, and yet at one point in history, "The Voice from Beyond" claimed that there was, the infallibility of "The Voice from Beyond" has been called into question. The New Ager who does not believe in Hell, going just from past experience, should not believe everything he/she "hears". For example, many New Agers believe that there are people living on Venus in another dimension (since it is known to be inhospitable in this dimension). To be sure, I can't prove that there is no fifth-dimensional Venus complete with a civilization in the same way that I cannot prove that there is no Hell. But at this point, I'm inclined to be a little skeptical: you have to give me something a little more convincing than assurances from "The Voice from Beyond."

The point to all this is that one can't depend on the veracity of "The Voice from Beyond," whether it comes from the mouth of a New Age spiritualist in a trance or a prophet from ages past. Whatever one ultimately chooses to believe must come from one's own reflection. One can't avoid the responsibility one has to think for oneself.