February 21, 1955 was the day of my “fall.” I was in a light green room, hanging upside down. This guy wearing a white mask over his face had grabbed me by my feet and whacked me on the behind! I screamed as I took my first breath inside this ‘thing’ called a human body! I was now a soul incarnate, subject to the trials and tribulations of the flesh on planet Earth. My ‘spacesuit’ of incarnation1 contained an entity called an ego, which made me forget my true identity as spirit.2 And I spent a lifetime trying to wake up and remember that I was a bite-sized piece of God having a ‘human’ experience.3
Now, more than 60 years later, this incarnation is coming to an end – not just for me – but possibly for most life forms on our planet.
As I write today, November 22, 2018, the headlines read, “The rain washed away the smoke and brought rainbows to the Bay Area.” 4 This is the first day we’ve had rain since the deadly Camp Fire began on November 8th. As I drive toward the northeastern hills of San Jose, from whence the fire emanates more than 200 miles away, an enormous rainbow dominates the sky. It is the widest rainbow I’ve ever seen. And its colors, the brightest! Strangely, the rainbow comes to an abrupt halt halfway up the sky, as if it were a ladder ascending the heavens.
As I drive closer, I see the rainbow as a luminous mystery. Perhaps the colorful rays of light are the spirits of those who have physically perished in the wildfire, letting us know that they are okay? Will we be okay? Who knows? Especially since, with global warming, atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide are now the same as they were five million years ago – long before we humans showed up! 5 And this warming trend will continue for centuries – even if we completely stop emissions of all greenhouse gases right now.6 The good news is that we can slow down the progression – if we halve greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.7 Yet, we’re running of time.
According to biologists, we are already in the early stages of a human-caused mass extinction, known as the Holocene (or Anthropocene).8 And since more than 90 percent of all organisms that have ever lived on Earth have become extinct,9 why should we be any different? We are bound to wind up in the direction we’re headed.
Thus far, the Camp Fire has wiped out at least 86 human lives and countless lives of fauna and flora. For the past two weeks, we mourn their passing as their ashes cast an orange blanket of smoke over the once blue, California sky. As I breathe, I am aware that I am inhaling their ashes as particles of air which are now a physical part of me.
It used to be that many of us would look forward to where we would like to live during certain stages of life. Today, as we inhale ash-filled orange smoke, we are reminded that we must also consider where and how we prefer to physically perish due to the effects of global warming. Whoever thought that living near trees, which produce oxygen and support life, could kill us as they burn up in wildfires caused by extreme drought?
In the San Francisco Bay Area, other choices are to live by the ocean or rivers where there may be severe flooding, in the central valley where temperatures reach 118 degrees and rising, on a hillside with a possible mudslide, or on a cliff where there may be a landslide. Or we could move elsewhere with a colder climate and experience the effects of the polar vortex – 50 degree sub-zero temperatures. Maybe it’s best to shelter-in-place in San Jose, where so far we’ve only had earthquakes, floods and raging rainstorms released by atmospheric rivers.
It’s no wonder that I find Fr. Seán ÓLaoire’s blog of January 23, 2018, Unless the Earth is Born Again, reassuring, as he writes that the Earth “needs to be re-birthed many times” and that the journey entails “quantum shifts from denser to more subtle dimensions of reality.” He recounts Gaia’s re-births of her ‘human denizens,’ from homo sapiens (thinking man), to homo sapiens sapiens (self-reflective man), to prototypes of homo spiritualis (spirit man, aware of its own divinity and the divinity of all manifestation), citing Gautama Siddhartha and Jesus of Nazareth as examples. And in his blog of October 31, 2018, Some Thoughts on Ecology, Fr. Seán says that our job is to move our species to homo spiritualis. Yet, for those of us who are already awake and God-conscious, what happens if – and when – we run out of time?
History has shown that, although mass extinctions are deadly events, new life-forms emerge and evolve to fit ever-changing ecological niches.10 So, say “hello” to pneuma spiritualis (spiritual spirits), our next evolutionary leap. Spirits without the spacesuits of incarnation! This has already happened to ‘human’ life on other planets.
My first encounter with pneuma spiritualis took place one night when I was awakened in astral body by a seven-foot-tall male astral being who was standing at the foot of my bed. Together we flew to the perimeter of his Earth located in a distant part of space. While gazing through the atmosphere, the planet’s surface appeared so peaceful and devoid of life incarnate. The being explained to me that they had faced similar issues with the destruction of their planet’s biosphere, became physically extinct and now inhabit the border of space surrounding the planet. Exactly which celestial sphere, I am not sure. Let’s call it a “Place Between Heaven and Earth.” (Although he was still able to traverse the spheres or he would not have traveled to Earth to awaken me.)
The being, speaking a language of strange sounds which I somehow understood, explained that a ‘planet’ belongs to every living thing that inhabits it and that a planet’s purpose is to support life. He told me that on our Earth, we would soon see “the end of avarice.”
And now, ten years later, this is happening. We are learning not to be attached to our wealth and possessions. They can be wiped out in an instant by wildfires, mudslides, landslides and flooding. And, no matter what our societal status, we may find ourselves temporarily living in a Walmart parking lot after our home is destroyed in a climate-caused disaster. It’s sad that we have to learn this lesson. Yet, it appears to be part of the plan. We are all just beings on a planet, subject to the laws of ecology on that planet.
All this makes me think of the Book of Revelation in the Bible. It was written by someone named “John” while in exile at a penal colony in Patmos, where members of the early church were persecuted by Roman authorities.11 Scholars say that the symbolic descriptions in the book are not to be taken as literal descriptions.12 Nor is the symbolism meant to be pictured realistically.13
However, many of the prophecies of John, a saint who led a life of prayer, isolation and suffering, are very relevant to our times. In Revelation 8:7 the Earth, trees and grasses burn up. In Revelation 8:9 and 16:3 creatures in the sea die – very pertinent, as just about every week we read news articles about turtles, sharks, whales and even hippos (semi-aquatic mammals), washing up ashore dead. And in Revelation 9:18 people die in ‘plagues of fire.’ And let’s not forget Revelation 8:11 where many people die from river and spring waters that become ‘bitter.’
And then, there’s great news! Revelation 21:1-4 foretells a new heaven and earth14 and that “There will be no more death15 or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”
Since we will no longer be subject to death, mourning, crying or pain, the implication is that we will be purely spiritual and no longer material. Just think … no longer being a soul incarnate, subject to the trials and tribulations of the flesh on planet Earth! No more spacesuit of incarnation16 with an ego, to make us forget our true identity as spirit!17 And no longer spending a lifetime trying to wake up and remember that we are each a bite-sized piece of God having a ‘human’ experience!18
So, how will it feel to be a spirit without an incarnational spacesuit? I can only extrapolate from my experience of the astral being, and my experience of who (and what) I was while with the astral being. Although I still had some sense of separate identity, my thoughts were quiet with an overriding sense of peace and at-one-ness with all of creation. Missing was the ego inside the human brain with thoughts and worries about me – what I must do, need to have or become, how I should act, or what others thought of me.
This “Place Between Heaven and Earth” is an interesting celestial abode where we begin to lose the sense of separateness and individuality19 yet have not returned to Source,20 which all mystical traditions endorse as the soul’s destiny.21 So, as Gaia continues to re-birth herself, she will re-birth us – next time, most likely as pneuma spiritualis spiritualis (really spiritual spirits).
For now, the thing to remember is that when we rise as rainbows from the ashes of our mass extinction, we will no longer suffer from physical life!
Bibliography
1 Colloquial phrase of Fr. Seán ÓLaoire, PhD
2 Ibid. Also: St. Gregory of Palamas: The Triads, Edited by John Meyendorff. Translated by Nicholas Gendle (Ramsey, NJ: Paulist Press, 1983), 27. Citing Book of John: 3:6,8.
3 Ibid 1.
4 Amy Graff (SFGATE.com):
https://www.sfgate.com/weather/article/rainbows-San-Francisco-photos-weather-forecast-13414703.php
5 Craig Miller (PRI.org) citing Bill Collins (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory):
https://www.pri.org/stories/2018-09-13/scientists-say-25-years-left-fight-climate-change
6 Ibid.
7 Global Climate Action Summit: https://www.globalclimateactionsummit.org/halving-greenhouse-gas-emissions-by-2030-roadmap-shows-whats-needed-in-each-sector/
8 Wikipedia.org: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction
9 National Geographic: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/prehistoric-world/mass-extinction/
10 Ibid.
11 United States Conference of Catholic Bishops: http://www.usccb.org/bible/revelation/0
12 Ibid.
13 Ibid.
14 Isaiah 65:17
15 Isaiah 25:8
16 Ibid. 1
17 Ibid. 1. Also: St. Gregory of Palamas: The Triads, Edited by John Meyendorff. Translated by Nicholas Gendle (Ramsey, NJ: Paulist Press, 1983), 27. Citing Book of John: 3:6,8.
18 Ibid. 1
19 Benjamin Walker: Beyond the Body, The Human Double and the Astral Planes,
(London, Henley and Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1977), 193-194.
20 Ibid. Also: Fr. Seán ÓLaoire, PhD: www.SpiritsInSpacesuits.com/cosmology
21 Ibid. 19
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