Genuine spirituality

To define spirituality is not easy, this for an obvious reason: it belongs to the transcendent dimension of the psyche and the cosmos in general, while our reasoning and our definitions belong to intellect and rationality. Transcendence belongs to symbolic, openness, availability, of eternity, whereas rationality has to base on material cause and effect, logic, the ongoing conflict between order and disorder, duration and finiteness.

To represent a transcendent phenomenon rationally is to return to project a 3D object on the horizontal plane, and take this 2D projection for the real object exists without knowing one dimension more than the x and y coordinates. An excellent metaphor was used by Plato to illustrate this inconsistency: the allegory of the “cave”, whose occupants (the common man) see of the external reality only the images projected on the bottom, while the reality is flooded with light and rich in another dimension who contemplates in its entirety (the gods and philosophers).

There is a long time that men, at least some “insiders” know that something essential is missing from the human condition and the image of the world such as the vehicle of culture. Spirituality remains because of this deficiency a (re)construction of the mind, a mixture between representations (intellect, beliefs, dogmatic), feelings (affect, frustration, hope), fantasies prefiguring the existence of a transcendent dimension ( paradise, nirvana), and requirement of faith in a divine quintessence generally unreachable.

The discomfort is such that a systematic split has developed between this universal aspiration, which feed on the various religions, and the world of the paranormal. Monotheistic religions allude in rare occasions renamed miracles – or deeds of the devil when not compatible with the credo in force. Secular miracles would unfairly compete with the ecclesiastical institution, so excluding them in advance of the beliefs system exposed to everyone. Other religions, including Eastern, respect psychic abilities as among the many powers of mind.

A Catholic priest, Father Bruno, traveled the world a few decades ago to fight the fragmentation of the spiritual. It demonstrated, in his lectures, that Christ’s miracles, miracles of saints, and paranormal phenomena are one and the same. Authentic spirituality can only restore this evidence, swept by centuries of clerical power and witch hunts.

Clairvoyance is not, however, a direct pledge of spiritual elevation. We are like the blind who started the conquest of a mountain, from which we have nothing but rumors and fantasies. Developing visions would be like finding the view, to recognize the steep paths, avoid precipices and thorny bushes, unnecessary circumvolutions, with the fatigue and suffering that inevitably result. They also allow us to behold the beauty of the landscape revealed at every stage – what Plato called the absolute Essence of Beauty …

There is no need therefore for the conventional image of an omnipotent father who judge and forgive or avenge us occasionally. No religious power can not install or operate the faithful. Everyone finds his guide itself, or through the psychic abilities of his relatives. Archetypes and their images full of symbols give oneself access to the transcendent meaning of one’s destiny. The interpretive work they call for day after day prompts in oneself a deep metamorphosis, made possible by energy they provide, without reference to dogmas, rituals or a liturgy. They gradually lead to rediscovering the primordial identity between Love and the Divine…

Authentic spirituality based on the natural potential of the human being, is far from what is left in our culture and is synonymous with caricatures…