After Pentecost

195:5.1The twen­ti­eth cen­tury has brought new prob­lems for Chris­tian­ity and all other re­li­gions to solve. The higher a civ­i­liza­tion climbs, the more ne­ces­si­tous be­comes the duty to “seek first the re­al­i­ties of heaven” in all of man’s ef­forts to sta­bi­lize so­ci­ety and fa­cil­i­tate the so­lu­tion of its ma­te­rial prob­lems.

195:5.2Truth of­ten be­comes con­fus­ing and even mis­lead­ing when it is dis­mem­bered, seg­re­gated, iso­lated, and too much an­a­lyzed. Liv­ing truth teaches the truth seeker aright only when it is em­braced in whole­ness and as a liv­ing spir­i­tual re­al­ity, not as a fact of ma­te­rial sci­ence or an in­spi­ra­tion of in­ter­ven­ing art.

195:5.3Re­li­gion is the rev­e­la­tion to man of his di­vine and eter­nal des­tiny. Re­li­gion is a purely per­sonal and spir­i­tual ex­pe­ri­ence and must for­ever be dis­tin­guished from man’s other high forms of thought, such as:

195:5.41. Man’s log­i­cal at­ti­tude to­ward the things of ma­te­rial re­al­ity.

195:5.52. Man’s aes­thetic ap­pre­ci­a­tion of beauty con­trasted with ug­li­ness.

195:5.63. Man’s eth­i­cal rec­og­ni­tion of so­cial obli­ga­tions and po­lit­i­cal duty.

195:5.74. Even man’s sense of hu­man moral­ity is not, in and of it­self, re­li­gious.

195:5.8Re­li­gion is de­signed to find those val­ues in the uni­verse which call forth faith, trust, and as­sur­ance; re­li­gion cul­mi­nates in wor­ship. Re­li­gion dis­cov­ers for the soul those su­preme val­ues which are in con­trast with the rel­a­tive val­ues dis­cov­ered by the mind. Such super­hu­man in­sight can be had only through gen­uine re­li­gious ex­pe­ri­ence.

195:5.9A last­ing so­cial sys­tem with­out a moral­ity pred­i­cated on spir­i­tual re­al­i­ties can no more be main­tained than could the so­lar sys­tem with­out grav­ity.

195:5.10Do not try to sat­isfy the cu­rios­ity or grat­ify all the la­tent ad­ven­ture surg­ing within the soul in one short life in the flesh. Be pa­tient! be not tempted to in­dulge in a law­less plunge into cheap and sor­did ad­ven­ture. Har­ness your en­er­gies and bri­dle your pas­sions; be calm while you await the ma­jes­tic un­fold­ing of an end­less ca­reer of pro­gres­sive ad­ven­ture and thrilling dis­cov­ery.

195:5.11In con­fu­sion over man’s ori­gin, do not lose sight of his eter­nal des­tiny. For­get not that Je­sus loved even lit­tle chil­dren, and that he for­ever made clear the great worth of hu­man per­son­al­ity.

195:5.12As you view the world, re­mem­ber that the black patches of evil which you see are shown against a white back­ground of ul­ti­mate good. You do not view merely white patches of good which show up mis­er­ably against a black back­ground of evil.

195:5.13When there is so much good truth to pub­lish and pro­claim, why should men dwell so much upon the evil in the world just be­cause it ap­pears to be a fact? The beau­ties of the spir­i­tual val­ues of truth are more plea­sur­able and up­lift­ing than is the phe­nom­e­non of evil.

195:5.14In re­li­gion, Je­sus ad­vo­cated and fol­lowed the method of ex­pe­ri­ence, even as mod­ern sci­ence pur­sues the tech­nique of ex­per­i­ment. We find God through the lead­ings of spir­i­tual in­sight, but we ap­proach this in­sight of the soul through the love of the beau­ti­ful, the pur­suit of truth, loy­alty to duty, and the wor­ship of di­vine good­ness. But of all these val­ues, love is the true guide to real in­sight.