Asatoma

“Lead me from the unreal to the real. Lead me from darkness to light. Lead me from mortality to immortality.”

As I was opening the Center with this prayer this morning, I came to the realization that I didn’t know if I really wanted God to “lead me from mortality to immortality.” I have so much to learn and so many things I want to do and understand that I really don’t know if I want to move into total union with God right now. That would mean that I wouldn’t be with my family and friends and enjoy their presence because I would be in the Spirit World. The realm of God and union with God (In Catholicism, it is called the “Beatific Vision”) is a reality totally beyond the physical, emotional, mental world. It is a realm of Pure Consciousness which means a realm that we cannot completely understand because each of us lives in the world of vibration. If I were immortal, I wouldn’t be able to continue to act and be like Christ, which is what every good Christian is called to be and how to act. I wouldn’t “have the time” to refine my ability to send positive, loving, high-powered energy to eliminate the germs that might be attacking one of my loved ones. I wouldn’t have the time to learn how to raise my level of love in my body so high that I would be able to change water into wine or help a paralytic to walk. Also, I wouldn’t be able to learn completely all the sacred scriptures, like the Bible, the Torah, the Tao de Jing, the Qur’an, the Buddhist Puranas, the Upanishads, the Vedas, and so on in their original languages. I wouldn’t have the ability and time, unless the human race learned how to directly program those into my mind (like in The Matrix). Even though I know that I am immortal and will, as the Yoga and Christian Traditions say, “never die,” I will miss the feelings of joy at learning all those things. I will miss the pleasure I have when I am playing with my grandchildren. I will miss, egotistically, the sense of power that I would feel as I healed others or knew the deep truths of the Sacred Scriptures of the world. I rather enjoy the yogic understanding of reincarnation with its belief that I have many lifetimes to fulfill all those mundane desires. Or maybe as many Christians who do not believe in reincarnation, I would live eternally in Heaven, aware of the presence of God, but instead of choosing total union with God, I would be eternally in heaven fulfilling all me desires for knowledge, ability and pleasurable relationships. This Christian view of heaven is considered free of pains and suffering. Well, in any case, whichever belief is true --reincarnation or eternity in a heaven of blissful learning and activity, I feel sad that I may not be praying truthfully. Yet, maybe my understanding of “immortality” is not accurate. Maybe I am totally in union with God now! What a wonder! Does that mean that God is totally one with all life now? I wonder! Namaste’