My dying mom snubbed healthcare

Around February 1995 I received a dreadful call from my mother. She gave me the news that her doctor “thought that she had pancreatic cancer.”

My first response to her was “What do you mean he thinks you have cancer?” She then told me that her doctor would have to perform a biopsy to be sure. So I asked her if she was going to get the procedure. Her answer indicated to me that she was uninterested.

“Don’t you want to know for sure?” I asked.  She still seemed ambivalent towards this invasive procedure. I then got my youngest brother on the phone (who was living with her at the time) and said that we had to convince mom that she should get the biopsy. He agreed.

It took both of us a period of two months to finally convince our mother to get the biopsy. I was relieved.

So the next time I talked to her on the phone I asked how things went. She replied, saying that the doctor somehow missed the tumor and would have to do it all over again.

I was pissed to hear this.

How could such a thing happen? After having twisted my mother’s arm to get the biopsy in the first place I knew there would be no way to convince her to have a second procedure performed on her. My heart sank.

I was confused as to why she did not want to know exactly what her status was. I was about to learn that she had accepted her fate and that she would tough it out. She refused all treatment, even though she had good healthcare insurance.

I visited her that spring. She acted normally but had some trouble eating. While taking a shower I developed a severe nosebleed. I suspect it was part sinus infection and part strained emotions. I ended up going to the emergency room to stop the bleeding. For the next few days it was my mom who was looking after me! How could this be?

I returned home, still alarmed at her condition. However, knowing that my brother was there to look over her brought a degree of calm to the situation. I had heard that pancreatic cancer was painful and assumed that she would seek treatment when the pain grew unbearable.

But she continued to tough it out. She suffered greatly, yet consciously.

That December I got a call from my brother that mom had finally said “It is time to take me to the hospital.” This did not mean she was ready for treatment, but ready to die.

By the time I was able to fly into New York from St. Louis, she was lying in her hospice bed, unconscious. Mom’s face was startlingly shrunken. I knew that her life force was receding from her corporeal body. What really caught my attention was her labored breathing—with each breath she gave out a straining sound as if she were punched in the stomach.

I asked my brother if she was on any painkillers. He said that in the hospital she had finally agreed to painkillers but that they gave her nightmares. She died in less than a week at the hospital. She simply had embraced a belief system that was different from most others. My mom did not see it as important to cling to this world. She had lived a full life and accepted God’s providence.

She died as a truly liberated woman.

I would gladly give up every post on this blog (and my two books) to be able to prove I had an equally strong inner constitution.

http://www.provinggod.com

Where does morality come from?

The clergy will tell you that morality comes from religion. Scientists like Richard Dawkins however, will state that morality is just another strategy used by “selfish” genes to increase the odds of their survival through replication. A moral society favors marriage—a social structure that augments the drive of genes to pass their traits to future generations via the reproductive process and protective care of loving parents.

Is morality the outcome of biological evolution? Or, is it from the revealed wisdom of a Divine Creator?

The evolution of bio-complexity shows a real trajectory towards increased intelligence and consciousness. While neuroscience struggles with the concept of person-level realities (subjective individual consciousness), morality is perfectly suited for the higher-level phenomena of the non-physical mind and human identity.

The neo-Darwinian synthesis of evolution is a physical theory by which species adapt to fill niches within a constantly changing physical environment. But humans have benefited from the exploitation of an entirely different resource—knowledge!

The human mind can distill knowledge from the universe in a way that other living creatures cannot. Furthermore, this knowledge is not only retained within the human memory IT IS ORGANIZED. Rational thought is impossible unless ideas can be arranged and organized into some coherent order.

The next thing to consider is that the human mind can only arrange ideas and information according to personal VALUES!  Morality is a dynamic specially suited for a creature that would evolve first-person phenomenal experience (which includes the cognitive functions of free will and discernment).

Morality, viewed from a faith-based perspective, hints strongly that religion is God’s special strategy by which evolution can continue into a non-physical realm through the proper organization of the human mind and spirit through nobler values.

This non-physical realm is called heaven. When the Lord said that “the kingdom of God is within you” He was making a scientific statement concerning the human heart and mind and that its proper organization extends the biosphere into a pre-geometrical, pre-spatial, spiritual realm.

Religion and morality seem to fill an ontological gap in the evolution of a mind that would need to be exposed to higher principles to help guide it through the non-physical realm of ideas, concepts, and information.

Religion is not a topic abstracted from science or evolutionary theory. Life has evolved to a level of intelligence where values matter! Religious values determine the higher level, non-physical, bio-complexity of the human spirit.

God and science are both necessary for a final theory of reality. My new book, Proving God, will add more flesh to this unique assumption.

Website: http://www.provinggod.com

The Seed and the Idea

Once upon a time there was a seed. It was an apple seed. It had landed on the ground last summer when the apple it was in fell from a branch high up on the apple tree.

Over winter, a deer ate the apple and left the seed on the ground.

The seed was a little sad because it was spring and it wondered if it would ever get the chance to reach its full potential and grow into a beautiful tree. But the apple tree growing over it blocked out the sun and had taken much of the soil’s fertility for itself over many long years.

Then one day, the seed had an unexpected visitor who came down from the sky and asked, “Why are you so sad?”

“I need to find a less shady spot and more fertile soil, so that I can grow into a beautiful tree,” said the apple seed. “Who are you? You look like me but seem very different?

“I am a seed from heaven. I am looking for fertile ground as well,” said the angelic visitor.

“What is a seed from heaven?” asked the worldly apple seed.

“I am a spiritual seed — an idea from God.”

“Where on earth are you looking to be planted?” came the inquisitive apple seed.

Just then, a gardener approached. She spotted the apple seed and picked it up. The spiritual seed followed the gardener as she carried the apple seed to a patch of soil that she had specially prepared. She then carefully planted the apple seed and watered it.

The two seeds, however, were able to continue their conversation.

“Now that I have found the perfect place to grow, where will you go?” asked the concerned apple seed.

“There is only one place you can plant an idea,” replied the angelic seed. And with that said, the heavenly seed went toward the gardener and planted itself inside her head. Suddenly the gardener’s eyes opened more widely as though she had gotten a new insight.

Over time, as the Gardener returned to the apple seed, which had now taken root and grown into a strong sapling, the two original seeds were able to continue to converse. One day when the gardener brought her son to see the young new apple tree, the two original seeds began a most instructive conversation.

“Look at me. I have taken root and grown into a small apple tree.”

“I have grown, too,” said the spiritual counterpart.

“But how were you able to take root?” asked the young apple tree.

“I have taken root in the fertile soil of the gardener’s rich experiences which are contained in her memory,” said the heavenly idea.

“What are you growing into?” questioned the curious sapling.

“Since I am rooted in the gardener’s mind, I must draw essential ingredients out of the gardener’s memory and reconstitute them into new mental structures. Instead of a tree, I am growing into a strong belief and faith in God.

“I have grown a stem, branches and leaves. And this year I made beautiful flowers. And look, I have even produced my first juicy red apple,” said the proud sapling.

“Yes, and I will do the same thing within the gardener’s mind. As I already told you my stem stems from organizing the rich material in her memory. This branches out into thoughts taking new directions. Each of these directions will allow her spiritual understanding to flourish like new green leaves unfurling at springtime. Following this, the gardener’s mind will blossom and flower, representing the special joy that comes with the anticipation of having her spiritual ideas bear fruit.”

“Wow,” said the apple sapling, “You can do everything that I do, except in a different place than I do.”

“That is because we both come from God and follow the same holy patterns.”

“I was made by God, too?” asked the sapling.

“Yes indeed, we both can equally express God’s infinite principle of proliferation. You will generate new seeds from your sweet fruit, which in turn will generate more seeds, forever and ever. I will do the same. As this gardener shares the fruits of her ideas with others, the sweetness of her kind act will plant new ideas in them as well. This will allow God’s ideas of love to pass from human to human, forever and ever.

At that point the gardener picked the first apple off the young tree and shared it with her young son. The two original seeds now found themselves working side by side – showing that the goodness of the apple was also the goodness of love.  

The Sons of God should not make babies with the Daughters of Men

This is one of the biggest problems facing today’s society. Such unprotected sex between these antipodal partners leads to generations of offspring with gigantic heads.

It is by pro-choice that these children are born. Abortion rights are mostly rejected when it comes to bringing such human deformity into the world. 

God warns of this horrible consequence in Genesis 6:4.

However, these pregnancies cannot be avoided (nor the resulting population explosion) unless we can transcend our usual interpretation of Scripture. Only this will allow us to escape from this terrible predicament.

Everything in God’s Holy Word contains deeper meanings with lessons about the inner realities of our hearts and minds. Therefore, Scripture actually describes outcomes not of our physical encounters, but of our core values.

In Scripture, when one can grasp that its stories reveal the hidden dynamics of the human heart and mind, then it can be comprehended that “sons” represent the progeny of one’s intellect and understanding. Daughters represent the offspring of our heart – the things we love.

The “Sons of God,” therefore, are the progeny of divine truth and doctrine. These “sons” are our knowledge and faith in God. The “Daughters of Men” represent the corporeal qualities of the human will – that is, ego, self-love, and love of the world.

What is not known is that, psychologically, the understanding impregnates the will.  

So, if the things we know about God have hanky-panky with our worldly compulsions, the resulting “birth” is a magnified and false imagination of ourselves. Anyone who has any knowledge and understanding of God, immerses these holy things in demeaning acts by making bad choices. This brings forth deformed principles and self-delusion – conceived and hatched from the copulation between one’s (unrepentant) heart and mind.

The only method of abortion for such dreadful things happening is to adopt the proper method of intercourse between faith and the human will. We each need to apply what we know about spiritual love to our heart. In other words, faith needs to be applied to our life, otherwise, faith is simply data in the memory that can be easily seduced by our inner motives (the daughters of men).

God’s Holy Word provides us with a sexual manual for obtaining eternal joy and pleasure. (It takes the concept of “safe sex” all the way to the soul.)

The purpose of religion is to stop the human tragedy of illegitimate spiritual births.

Five Fingers Become Friends

Once upon a time there were five fingers. As they were talking among themselves a debate erupted that centered around which of them was the most important.

“I am,” said the thumb. “Without me the hand could not grasp anything.”

“Oh yeah,” returned the index finger, “I am the only one who can point to all the different things in the world.”

“Excuse me my finger friends, but I am longer and stand taller than all of you. Is that not visible proof of my greater importance?” said the middle finger.

“Hold on,” replied the ring finger. “Love is the most important thing in the world, and when people get married they put their wedding ring on me.”

“I am the most important finger because I represent culture and sophistication,” quipped the pinky finger. “I am the one people raise when drinking quality tea, wine, or champagne.”

The discussion between the five fingers soon turned into a heated argument. And they began to make unflattering remarks about each other.

The index finger pointed out to the thumb, “If you were so important we would be all thumbs and become clumsy at everything we did. I’m number one because I am the finger people raise up to express being number one.”

“But I can negate everything you say with a simple thumbs down motion,” said the thumb as it made a downward turn.

“None of you have my stature,” responded the middle finger.

“But you have no class,” argued the little pinky back at the middle finger.

You are all drab and nothing special,” said the ring finger. “I shine next to all of you because only I am wearing gold.”

Suddenly an angel appeared and asked the five fingers why they were arguing.

“We want to know which one of us is the most important finger,” said the little pinky.

“Perhaps you can tell us who is best,” said the ring finger to the angel.

“You all are important,” said the angel. “That is why God made five fingers for each hand. When you team up together you can do much more than what you can do alone. Cooperation allows you to work with tools to build things, write books, create art and play musical instruments, and most of all, give a helping hand to others.”

“I can grasp that,” said the thumb.

“You make an excellent point,” followed the index finger.

The other fingers soon began to bend as well to what the angel was saying.

“The world would be turned into heaven if all fingers got together from everywhere to hold hands and help each other,” said the wise angel.

“Yes,” acknowledged the ring finger, “that is what true love is all about.”

The fingers were now all in agreement and made an “okay” sign to the angel as she disappeared into the blue sky above the clouds. They all vowed that they would spend the rest of their lives cooperating and reaching out to others.

Website: http://www.staircasepress.com

Celebrate A Spiritual Father’s Day

Father’s Day is a time for honoring the Dads of the world. That this occasion also falls on a Sunday makes it a great reminder that we ought to be extra thankful to the Lord God, who is our Spiritual Father.

However, celebrating one’s Spiritual Father is a bit more challenging then celebrating one’s earthly father.

After all, God is well beyond the reach of a Father’s Day Card or a long distance phone call. You can’t take God our to a fancy restaurant, either.

Will simply attending Sunday service on this special day make it special enough? What could you personally do to guarantee making this Father’s Day very special to God?

What would make a really special gift to show your sincere gratitude and love for your Father in Heaven?

The answer to this is a special commitment – a commitment to transcend one’s biological self and truly become a spiritual son or daughter of our Lord God. This is not something that can be accomplished in a day, a month, or a year.

It requires that a new spiritual birth take place from deep inside us, profoundly changing our everyday lives. The Lord, while on earth, revealed the secret to this spiritual process in the simplest terms by boiling the Ten Commandments down to just two – loving God and loving the neighbor.

Sounds simply enough, right? But as we all know, we find ourselves falling way short of such high ideals.

Why is our loving others, and being good, so hard to do? Shouldn’t it be easy?

It seems as though something always gets in the way of our good intentions. In fact, we never take this “something” into account when we engage others.

What we always fail to take into account is our own love of self and self-pride. The reason for this miscalculation is that ego-centeredness is normally quite invisible to the habitual mind.

We can easily see self-centeredness in others, so why should it be so difficult to see in ourselves? The answer to this is that observation alone is needed for us to see this flaw in others, but to see it in ourselves requires our permission. We must want to see unflattering things in ourselves (this is the barrier).

Sincere introspection needs more than seeing. It must be supported by the heart and will.

The point to be made is that unless these unflattering characteristics are recognized and removed, they will always muddy-up our attempts to be good and live spiritual lives. It is only when we ask God for help in detecting and removing these flaws from our lives that our spiritual rebirth begins. And our old life dies away.

This shows God our sincerity and we want to change in our lives.

As these various flaws are removed, we make more room in our hearts for genuine good to flow in from God’s Love.

Before this spiritual process takes place, much of the good people do are merely outward fabrications of goodness and done for the sake of prestige, personal gain, and even fame. Only the removal of these ego-traits will ensure genuine goodness (and abolish hidden agendas). 

Humbleness is how we become children of God. Putting others first is the best gift that you could give God for Father’s Day.  

 

The Heart, The Eye And The Hand

There once was a very, very, sad heart. She loved to do everything but was unable to do anything about it. Even with all her passion she did not know how to get things done. The reason was she never received an education. In fact, she did not even know what learning was. All she could do was wish, and wish, and wish.

The poor heart felt that she was out of rhythm with the world’s pulse and was bored of her endless life of diastolic and systolic repetition that was getting her nowhere.

So she began to cry.

“Why are you so sad?” came a voice not far away. Unfortunately, because love is blind, the heart could not see who was addressing her and said, “Who is it? I cannot see.”

“I can see,” said the stranger. “I am an eye.”

“What is an eye?” inquired the heart.

“I was specially designed to see,” answered the eye. “There is nothing in the world that escapes my attention. I can look at everything and learn about anything.”

The heart started to beat with new excitement. “Could you please help teach me what you know so that all my desires and wishes can be turned into action and come true?”

The eye looked around, searching for a way to reply. Then he squinted, as if pained by the heart’s plea. “I know how to do things, but it is quite clear to me that I have never done anything myself, either,” confessed the eye. “No matter what I focus on, I do not have the ability to accomplish a single thing,”

Things now seemed worse than before. Not only was the heart still sad, but now the eye began to shed a tear as well. Together, they wanted to do things and knew how to do things but they still lacked ability.

“Why are you two so sad?’ came a nearby voice. “Perhaps I can offer a hand.”

“Who are you?’ asked the heart.

“I know, I know!” said the eye. “I can see that it is a hand.”

“I have ability,” pointed out the hand. “I was designed to be handy. But alone I am nothing more than a knucklehead.” The hand opened up and admitted, “I need what you two have – the desire and the knowledge.” Then the hand snapped his fingers and said, “Perhaps if we all got together and shared our talents, we could accomplish great things.

The eye opened wide with excitement as he suddenly gained a new grasp of things. And the heart was so touched by the hand that she replied. “Let’s do it. I’m pumped!”

Suddenly, a most beautiful angel appeared before them. She smiled at the three and said, “God has specially designed each of you and brought you together to enjoy a most sacred and holy partnership.”

“Why is our joining together holy?” asked the curious heart.

“Every time you all act together, you are representing and celebrating the three wonderful aspects of God’s nature, which are Divine Love, Divine Wisdom, and Divine Action. God has given you the similar sacred gifts of loving, knowing, and doing.

The heart, eye and hand turned to each other to verify the angel’s words. “That feels right to me,” said the heart. “I see exactly what the angel is saying,” followed the eye. “Those are words I can hold onto for life,” motioned the hand while making an “okay” sign with his fingers.

So the heart, the eye and the hand lived happily ever after – as they were meant to live under God’s divine, eternal plan.

http://www.staircasepress.com

The Easter Bunny Spills the (Jelly) Beans

The morning sun was just coming up. The early light revealed a world waking up from its long winter slumber. The grass was turning a vibrant green, fragrant yellow daffodils were blooming, and swelling buds were about to burst open on all the trees and shrubs in the neighborhood.

It was Easter Sunday.

Nature’s resurrection each spring seemed perfectly orchestrated to provide the perfect metaphorical backdrop for honoring the Lord’s resurrection. To help augment the metaphorical stage of the miraculous event that occurred on the first Easter, another miraculous event was taking place in people’s very own backyards. During this quiet time of the morning, while everyone was still sleeping, the Easter bunny was quietly and carefully hiding specially decorated eggs for the children.

This Easter bunny prided himself in being able to hide eggs in places that made them a challenge to find. After all, one of life’s big lessons is that finding anything of value requires effort and searching. The busy bunny had just finished hiding his last egg. Suddenly, he was startled by someone behind him shouting, “I’ve caught you!”

The magical bunny turned around to see that he had just been discovered by a young boy.

“I knew it! I knew there was such a thing as the Easter bunny!” said the excited child. Apparently, the boy had gotten out of bed early, put on his clothes, and quietly snuck out the back door in order to get a glimpse of the elusive bunny.

“How can you see me?” asked the magical bunny.

“Because your fur is so white,” answered the boy as if to point out the obvious.

On reflection of the matter, the holiday hare realized that children, because of their innocence, could often see and understand things that are invisible to parents. Caught red-handed in the act of hiding the Easter eggs, the bunny felt the need to explain himself in this awkward situation.

“I am not just a common rodent or lagomorph,” responded the fluffy mythical critter. “I am a metaphor, with real ontological status. I represent a higher-level reality. I am from the spiritual world.”

“Wow! Do you live with real angels when you are not busy hiding eggs?” asked the inquisitive youth.

“Yes, I appear before angels, carrying my special basket, every time they focus their attention on the things that symbolize the resurrection of the Lord. Let me explain by first telling you a great secret,” whispered the bunny.

The inquisitive lad put his ear closer to better hear the rabbit’s hushed voice.

“Every object in the world has a spiritual meaning. So when angels are thinking, objects appear before them that symbolize those meanings,” said the bright bunny. “For instance, my white fur represents the purity of truth. Rabbits are known for their fertility, yet we are also meek and have a humble standing among larger and stronger animals. So we not only symbolize fertility and new life, but that humility is the state of mind that is most fertile for new spiritual life to emerge. Easter represents spiritual rebirth.”

“Does your Easter basket also represent things in heaven?” asked the fascinated child.

“Yes indeed,” responded the smiling rabbit with a quick nose wiggle. “Baskets are for receiving things. An Easter basket represents the gifts that the Lord places in our hearts. The sweet candies represent the sweetness of loving acts. The green grass symbolizes a new activity in our hearts and the beginning of good things that will help our lives to flourish spiritually. Even yellow and purple, the colors of Easter, represent genuine goodness and wisdom.”

“What about Easter eggs? I love to color and help my mom decorate them,” said the wide-eyed boy.

“Easter eggs offer us an especially powerful image of new life. Angels understand eggs as representing the incubation of a new spiritual life within the human heart and will. All the wonderful ways in which Easter eggs are individually decorated represent our personal mental joy of anticipating new beginnings.”

The young boy thought carefully about all he had heard, then asked, “If all this happens in heaven, where angels are, how did these ideas reach all the way down here in my world?”

“The minds of angels and the minds of men and women are closely linked. My presence before the angels of heaven leads to these same ideas secretly flowing into the thoughts of men and women here on earth. That makes me more real than a physical rabbit. If I were not more real, I would not have the unique power to affect peoples’ customs in the mundane world. But my real secret mission is to help people enter the kingdom of heaven,” winked the enchanted bunny.

He then gave the boy the most beautifully decorated egg of all, saying, “I’m here to offer a fun way for people of all ages to become as little children.”

Loving Children for Heaven

An unexpected area that offers fertile ground for unifying science with religion is to be found from some relatively recent discoveries in neuroscience concerning the importance of love. Unlike the cerebrum, the cerebellum can continue to create new neurons within a child’s early life. The surprising stimulus that triggers the formation of these new neuron’s in a child is parental hugging, rocking, being picked up, and other forms of physical closeness including being fussed over.

So, as the cerebellum develops it can continue to form new connections with the emotional centers of the Limbic system, which in turn, promote alertness in the thinking brain or cerebrum of the child. Parental love therefore has a big effect on a child’s learning abilities and his or her curiosity of the world by implanting the affection for acquiring knowledge. While I am a Christian I was delighted to learn that in Hinduism a mother is called a child’s first guru. This is because they understood that love first opens the mind to learn.

Scientists believe that an infant deprived of the warmth and physical closeness of parental intimacy will suffer improper emotional development and reduced cell connections, which can lead to dysfunctional and anti-social behavior. But I want to return to the positive side of things, where parental love can help God’s ultimate goal of taking a child’s mind beyond normal worldly development and intellectual curiosity.

Eighteenth Century scientist and theologian, Emanuel Swedenborg learned from his deep spiritual experiences that hugging and the warmth of physical closeness could also play a crucial role in the inner growth and spiritual development of a child. He discovered that God carefully protects and stores these precious moments of innocent love and peace deep within the involuntary and unconscious mind (cerebellum) of the child. Swedenborg called these stored feelings remains, because they remain protected from the developing cerebrum which is influenced by the allurements of the world.

These remains are re-activated later by God where they can be used as a foundation or matrix for further spiritual growth. This divine operation is felt in an individual as a new yearning for something greater than the physical world of the senses can offer. Its commencement is represented in the Genesis story of Holy Scripture by the passage, “And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep, And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters” (Gen. 1:2). God’s moving in this deep darkness represents the stirring up of the remains within the depths of the unconscious mind, which then bubbles up into the emotional centers of the Limbic system until it becomes a new conscious striving in the cerebrum.

The Genesis story, when translated into its higher quantum vocabulary, actually addresses our spiritual re-creation or epigenesis and the seven stages that mark our return to innocence and peace (and God’s rest). Do you believe that the Holy Word can contain a multi-leveled quantum vocabulary capable of communicating God’s infinite wisdom?