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Word Gems 

exploring self-realization, sacred personhood, and full humanity

 

James Webster

 

 

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An afterlife investigator of more than 60 years, James Webster's contributions to the field of afterlife research I count as very valuable.

His book, "The Case Against Reincarnation," was the beginning of opening my eyes to this monstrous illusion.

Reincarnation (R) is a quasi-religion of the world. A cult religion. My old college friend, Adrian Smith, during a recent radio interview, commented that fundamentalism-cultism keeps the troops in good order by adhering to a very narrow party-line and not allowing any dissent or contrary idea. But once any of its members opens his or her mind to alternate views, the days are numbered for a "one true religion."

Many years ago, I attended, for a time, a Wednesday night discussion group sponsored by a local Spiritualist Church. They knew some things about the afterlife, bits and pieces here and there, but with a whole lot of error mixed in. But their prize doctrine was "R." At the time, I naively thought they might like to hear about latest research, study, and thought on the subject, but my efforts in this regard were met with hostility or apathy. At times, the leader of the group, the pastor, would publicly single me out for ridicule before the others.

They were very closed-minded, and didn't care about the evidence. All cult religions operate this way. They live in a very tight and restricted "reality tunnel" and will attempt to keep their members from new ideas. They cannot win an argument on the honest merits of the case, and so they attempt to survive by censorship, which is the underlying dynamic of "political correctness" - such a polite term for a totalitarian shutting-down of free speech and free thought.

 

more than drinking the koolaid

The long reach of cultism encompasses much more than crackpot churches. The root idea of cult offers the sense of "cut." This core concept of "cut" leads us to images of refinement and refashioning and, by extension, development, control, pattern, order, and system.

Cultism as systemization finds a ready home in religion and philosophy which seek to regulate and redistill the patterning and ordering of ideas. However, in a larger sense, the spirit of cultism extends to every facet of society. We find it scheming and sedulously at work in politics, academia, family, corporations, entertainment, science, artistry – anywhere power might be gained by capturing credulous and fear-based minds.

See the “cultism” page for a full discussion.

 

They thought they possessed irrefutable evidence for "R." After all, what about birth marks, past lives, child prodigies, and the like? - is this not evidence? Well, it is, but it's as convincing as "the Sun rises in the East, look for yourself, what could be more obvious?" But the Sun doesn't rise in the East after all, no matter the easy first impressions. In fact, from a higher perspective, we see that the Sun doesn't rise at all. Some points of "evidence" blow away like dry combine chaff in August with the advent of a little more information and clearer vantage point. We discussed all this at length in the article on "R."

I owe James a debt. He was the one to show me a better way of thinking, with a more complete survey of the data. After that, it was all over for "R" - it fell like ten-pins and never recovered.

 

 

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