2021-09-08-Justice and Forgiveness

Heading

Facilitators

Session

Opening

Topics: Stillness, the terminology we use, maturing in our presentation of the gospel, the light in our eyes, new abortion law and forgiveness, the spiritual life and rehabilitation, egalitarian justice, live conversationally with God.

Aaron: We invite you into the stillness with us. Enjoy that presence as we seek to deepen the connection and share in the camaraderie of our familial relations with one another in the presence of our Father and all the attendant hosts. Recognize again, that sometimes in the quiet, what is unsaid can be as important as what is said. The practice of feelingly experiencing your connection with God can be deeply personal and heartfelt. Know that as we approach you there is no sidestepping of this presence, for you can rest assured that anywhere in the universe where spiritual contact is being made, the spirit of our Father is present and engaged.

Lesson

I am Aaron, it is good to be present here with you tonight. I am the spokesperson this evening for our band of siblings, to play upon your recent resonance to this term. As you seek to share your experiences with others, recognize that the terminology you use can be adapted to the situation as needed, as long as the intention is pure. Requiring you to slavishly use words like Father or brother or fellow or any other term, would only place needless inhibitors to the spreading of the true message of your universal relationship to God and all the creaturedom that stems from that source.

Learn to be intuitive in how you speak with others so that you may know or better feel what another may resonate to and find attractive and alluring. Maturing in the proclamation of the gospel is necessary in the times you live, for the explosion of information is at hand and no crystallized method will be satisfactory at this time to large groups of people. But one thing transcends all the barriers of language and it is the purity of your intention, the goodwill you exude, the light in your eyes, so that what might be considered offensive when dryly expressed, suddenly becomes acceptable as they recognize the essence of your spirit.

And all of this comes back to the beginning of our conversation this evening. To rest easy in the presence of God, to allow that connection to deepen, so that you might, from there, express who you are and what you are about at a higher level of purity. Thank you for allowing me this introduction tonight and we are certainly open to your questions, my friends.

L: Thank you Aaron. I love the word “intent.” If only we could wear a sign across our forehead showing our intent, it would save a lot of pain and trouble. I just love that word “intent.”

M: We kind of wear a sign… Aaron referred to the light in our eyes.

Aaron: Yes, your intention is made known at any time, for when you are distracted, that is part of what you are expressing, and if you are focused and pure, in touch with your essence, it can be as if you had a sign on your forehead. Learning to find that place is the challenge, not to be so distracted or unfocused or disconnected from your presence within.

S: The sign on my forehead today was absolute frustration and anger, relating to the law regarding abortion in Texas and the Supreme Court ruling. I lost two relatives to back yard abortions who died, one who had been raped and another who had been forced to have sex with her boss to keep her job. So when this came down it was really hard on me. I don’t expect a lot of change here anytime soon, but what about the afterlife? We have people who have stolen and taken from others and hurt others. What happens to them on the other side? I know there have been transmissions about forgiveness, but in my human body right now I just don’t have it. Can you give me any kind of solace, understanding or perspective?

Aaron: Thank you for your willingness to express something that is on the minds of many people in your country, on your world. There are two sides of this, the here and now, and the later.

It may be difficult from a human conception to understand the approach on the spiritual side, for it is true that any who desire connection with God and to endeavor along the paths of progress and ascension, will have that opportunity regardless of what they have done in their human life. But you have also heard it said that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of heaven, so to speak. This is not because something is being denied to them, but because they chose to focus their development in areas that stifled the development of their soul, and without a survivable soul, one cannot exist past the mortal life. And so some degree of spiritual development is necessary to progress forward.

The question is, what is the degree of your sincerity and your honest exploration of questions of moral choice? These are the things that you grapple with that help develop your soul. It doesn’t mean you must always make the right choice, but that you are exploring the value in the questions at hand each day. If one spends their entire life immersing themselves in the physical animalistic pleasures, ignoring the effect on others, seeking wealth for themselves and power over others, then those are the choices these persons have made which bring them to the place where they will either survive or not in the ascending life.

But recognize that you will be surprised at who survives and moves on. There are people who have not always done the highest choice, the best actions, but who ultimately choose to accept the ascension plan and to adjust to the reality when it is placed before them, and yes they will rehabilitate to the degree that is necessary for them to progress. So this is the after.

The here and now: Recognize that forgiveness generally is for the forgiver rather than the forgiven. Your ability to let things go and not bear grudges and hold on to them so that they eat at you, is what I am alluding to here, for one can forgive a predator whose weakness caused them to act out against another and still not… I am challenged with how to phrase this through the receiver’s mind. Forgiveness does not mean overlooking the problems or ignoring that they exist, but that you place both yourself and the one you are challenged with in the presence of God or the highest conception you have of that, and see them from their potential.

But most importantly, recognize that how you will move forward is more important to understand and to come to grips with. It also does not mean that you do not have to stand up for yourself and for what you believe is true and right and express that to the degree that you are able. Sometimes poor decisions, terrible laws, can be a catalyst for those who feel the injustice, to rise up and make sure the injustice does not stand in the long term.

Unfortunately on Urantia, everything that happens will not always be to your liking or even our liking, for choices are being made in many areas, but also recognize that there is an effort building toward an eventual expression of egalitarian justice and the desire for community within the expressions of individualism. Not all expressions of freedom are equal. I hope this answers some of what you are asking this evening.

S.: Thank you. It did calm me down a bit. You brought up a point I wanted to follow up on. My challenge is this idea of inequity. Some people toil and barely eke out a living. So it’s hard for me to accept that a billionaire, because of some donation, qualifies him to be eligible for further spiritual development. It bothers me, the idea that someone has an easy life and at the last moment sees the light, and then is welcomed with open arms into the fold. My thought is he should come back and struggle and come to grips with how he hampered people by his behavior. That, to me, is the moral struggle that sticks in my craw. The idea of rehabilitation is a good idea. What can you say about what types of rehabilitation would have to be experienced?

Aaron: Rest assured that the administration of justice throughout the universes is fair at its very essence. To use the human phrase, “no crime goes unpunished,” if you look at this in a spiritual sense, this is not because there is a desire for punishment but that there is a natural response to one’s actions - cause and effect. What you do has ramifications and those ramifications will be explored in your spiritual journey, allowing you to come to a place where you can forgive yourself for what you have done prior so you might move on into a higher level of expression. For unless this forgiveness can happen, it is not possible to fully experience the spiritual life.

S: It’s absolutely true. In my work as a therapist, I don’t see people who have an easy life having compassion or understanding or sensitivity, gentleness, or kindness to the same degree as someone who has made conscious decisions to push themselves to do good. I guess that’s the key that I’m struggling to understand.

Aaron: Yes, all these things you mentioned are true. The lack of empathy is a barrier and the question is whether it is an impenetrable barrier or one that can be traversed. As one moves into their morontia life, these questions will be thoroughly ironed out and some will choose not to continue, and some will choose unreality over reality.

S: That brings me to a great question because I deal with denial all the time, minimization of behavior and how it impacts others. I’m curious, once they leave the human body is there a different process they go through to make that decision?

Aaron: Although we cannot explain too much of what will happen when you move beyond the human experience, there is a thorough immersion into all of the various aspects of development in the mansion world experience. Those who did not raise children will raise children. Those who lacked empathy will have sensitivity training.

D: What about those of us who want revenge?

Aaron: You will have the opportunity to lose that part of yourself.

D: Can’t he just stand there and we get to walk by and kick him in the ass? Maybe the masses he affected negatively have the opportunity to pinch him or talk to him and say this is what happened because of what you did? The human wants some kind of justice and recognition of the wrong. There are prison worlds right?

Aaron: Thank you for your added insight, with a lacing of humor. Of course, these feelings of vengeance or revenge are things you must iron out, just as they have things they must iron out. You will all have the opportunity to reflect upon your actions or inaction and to explore the value or lack thereof. You all will have the opportunity to explore the weaknesses, because hopefully by now you recognize that weaknesses are just an opportunity to become strengths in the spirit if one is sincere and purely looking to grow. But no, there are no lineups and taunting or pinching or kicking allowed.

L: I used to get on my soapbox and I got to the point where I had to tell myself time and time again, that I’m not responsible for their actions, but for my reactions. This last new law is like a piercing in my heart and I feel we’ve gone back more than 50 years. To me, the law is surreal. I don’t see how I can handle it. This is cruelty and trying to own another person’s body. I don’t understand it.

Aaron: Thank you. Yes, this is a challenging decision and the times are challenging that you face in the near future, but I think we are pretty confident that you are able to rise to this challenge, to speak up, to speak out. Ultimately, injustice will occur at times, on a planet that is still struggling to find its center, to find its connection to the core principles of spiritual progress that would lead to a more egalitarian future. How you respond to this and to most things in your life is what we are concerned with. You each have developed a strong sense of right and wrong. What would it be like if a collective uprising of strong people with this sense emerged and demanded justice?

You know you have seen it before in your country and on your world, with Ghandi, with Martin Luther King, Mother Theresa, Joan of Arc. There are questions to be answered for each of you, personally, how you will respond when you feel an injustice has occurred. Know that you are capable of turning the other cheek, to return a positive for the negative, to find a way to utilize the opportunity to express a higher truth.

We would love to sit you down now and tell you exactly what you must say, but this is not allowed, but we can try to inspire you to be that expression where you are for your world. When you are enraged, I suggest the beginning, where you go back into the calm, turn it over to God, explore it with that presence and allow yourself to be infused before you respond.

L: That helps a lot. I have a curiosity question. Will the perpetrators be able to feel the pain they inflicted? Like a life review? That’s a curiosity question, isn’t it?

Aaron: Yes it is.

L: Okay. (Laughing)

Aaron: And let me just say that the opportunity to experience the result of your actions will be there for everyone and how they receive it is up to them.

L: Thank you.

E: I think I’d like to say, historically, our society is influenced by the global situation and the ugliness human beings are capable of doing, but I think from what I’ve heard you say, is that we have to continue to do good, and last time we talked about extinguishing the darkness and that’s not going to happen unless we do the best we can with the good we can do. We have probably all unintentionally hurt other people and we, too, need forgiveness, and sometimes that’s rather hard to receive. But I think if we let go and let God take care of it, it takes a lot of the burden off of us to correct these wrongs and that we would be freer to go about doing goodness. Can you elaborate on that idea?

Aaron: At times, your expressions in response to our answers, enlighten as much as our answers can, so thank you for your great summary of our intent to express regarding your ability to go about doing good, and how it is a higher reality than feeling a sense of hurt and pain. This is not always easy to do, but if you can rally yourselves in the spirit of God, then it allows you to be, in a sense, a point of goodness on the map, where those you come in contact with have the opportunity to witness expressions at a higher degree than railing against the darkness.

E: Would you expand on how each one of us can implement a process where we can further along our own abilities to reconcile within ourselves these pains we experience, not only personally, but with others? How do you help us improve on our abilities to deal with these issues? We have stillness, but if you have other techniques you could give us?

Aaron: Honestly, the best guidance we can offer you is to get in touch with your core, allow that presence into your lives more frequently, in a conversational manner, not in the sense that “God’s over there and I can only access him once in a while when I get in the right space,” but that “God’s right here with me, and if I’m hurting I can just tell him that I’m hurting. If I’m joyous I can share the joy.”

So to the degree that you can see that as an ongoing relationship rather than a segmented, once in a while connection, to that degree you are able to see from a higher place, ask for clarity or understanding in the moment, and make better decisions, because you know the presence is with you now in this moment as you are feeling whatever it is you are feeling. This practice will help you more than any other in being able to know when to forgive, know when to speak out, know when to hold your tongue, etc.

And so are there other stop gap techniques you can use? Perhaps, but none will be as effective as the core integral relationship with spirit you can develop, such that it is there when you need it and not waiting for a long period of silence to access it.

E: Thank you so much.

Closing

Aaron: My friends, thank you for your presence this evening. I will withdraw at this time and let you all reflect upon what we have discussed this evening. Feel free to inquire within with your questions. I am fairly certain that our Father will answer you. Of course, your recognition of it may vary, but know this is the supreme challenge you face to develop this experience individually. But yes, we enjoy it when you can come together collectively, as well, and share your thoughts and concerns.