Talk at Unitarian Church on 8 7 05 by Lloyd J. Klapperich

I would like to begin by thanking you for allowing me to speak to your fellowship. I have always regarded the Unitarian Church as among the most open-minded of groups in search of spiritual enlightenment.

I consider it to be an honor and a privilege to share some thoughts and reflections on what has been described in your bulletin for this Sunday as "Guidance for the 21st Century - Hope For Humanity".

But before we get too far into the subject matter, I would like to share some thoughts in the area of what might be described Professional Demotions, that goes something like this:

If lawyers are disbarred and clergymen defrocked, doesn't it follow that:

Electricians can be de-lighted, Musicians de-noted, Cowboys de-ranged, Models de-posed, Dry cleaners de-pressed.

Furthermore, can---- Bed makers be de-bunked, Baseball players de-based, Landscapers de-flowered, Bulldozer operators de-graded, Organ donors de-livered, Software engineers de-tested, Underwear makers de-briefed, and Musical composers de-composed?

On a more positive note, though, perhaps we can hope that politicians will be de-voted.

And I'm sure that after all that "de-noting, de-flowering, de-bunking, and de-grading" you're feeling a lot more "DE-ified at this point.

If so, that was intended.
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Back on July 3rd, the Reverend Piper initiated a series of talks on the subject of the Cultural Wars as they relate to the Polarized Beliefs that affect our country today. He began those talks with the question: How did we get here?  And went on to answer with a scholarly review of the Religious Pluralism in America from 1750 through 1980, and on to the present day, exploring the circumstances which have altered the course of our nation's history.

In Pat Peason's spiritual and mystical talk on July 10th, he raised following questions:

Where did we come from?

Who Are We?

What happens when we die?

To all these questions, I would like to add yet another: That being: Why Are We Here?

Could it be that the real reason that we are here in this physical life experience is to realize our ability to Create Our Own Reality and to grasp the human potential that such empowerment might suggest?

Perhaps our human purpose is to express fully our Spiritual Nature in physical form.

Although we have made great progress, in a technological sense, in the last 500 plus years. Spiritually, as humans, we would seem to be struggling.

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Back in the 17th Century, when scientists and philosophers such as Renee Descartes were sitting around contemplating the nature of the world as they observed it, they found themselves in a quandary. They were struggling to figure out how they could rationalize the scientific evidence that was being examined in the Objective world with the abstract concepts associated with Religion in the Subject world.

Eventually, a bargain was struck with the Church. This Rap-proche-ment (French pronunciation)  allowed Science to explore and explain how the physical universe functioned while continuing to allow Religion to explain everything else.

For example, physicists could affirm how a body in motion would tend to stay in motion and a body at rest would tend to say at rest based upon the law of inertia.

Religion, with the support of the Ruling Aristocracy of the time, would explain to the serfs and underclass of Europe (who were eking out a bare-existence at the bottom of the economic scale) that the more suffering they endured in this life - the greater would be their reward in heaven.  Because - Well because that was God's will. So God continued to be given credit for anything that Science could not explain. This included flood, famine, drought, deadly diseases and even war.  Even though Science was making progress in many areas ------ "God's Will" was the phrase most often heard when bad things happened.

Neither group, the Scientific-Minded nor the governing forces of Church and even the State, were much willing to consider the possibility that human beings might have a greater role to play in their own well-being.

On the contrary, the idea that human beings were meant to be the victims of their circumstances, rather than creators of such, tended to support a whole realm of vested social, political, religious, economic and medical Institutions - as it still does.

The Hebrew Religion, the traditional Christian Religious Institutions and even the Islamic Religion proceeded to favor the idea that this world is where man is put to suffer and that, if (and only IF) he obeys all the rules, the next life is where he will get his Just Rewards - For most, Heaven is considered the place we will graduate to in order to be content with the experience of being in the presence of God - forever.

For others, heaven is having 76 Virgins available on demand. The later is, of course, an Islamic MALE vision. Christians, on the other hand, tend to be more celibate in their concept of Heavenly Rewards. But that might simply due to a lack of imagination.

With the introduction of the Darwin School of Evolution, the Scientific Community assured us that we were all little more than an end product of some chemical accident that occurred millions of years ago - in the muck. That we were all descendants of the ape ---- although I'm not quite sure how it's possible to DESCEND from the ape.

Meanwhile, the Religious Community would hold fast to the Bible or Koran source of the truth. It defended the idea that God (or Allah) was a particular personality who not only got the human race going, but continues to keep track of every individual's conduct while testing, rewarding and punishing each of us in some arbitrary fashion. With over 6 million people on this planet at this point, that would seem to be a very taxing job.

Some, such as Fredric Nietzsche, were sure that God had died or that he just decided --- To hell with it and started the whole process again somewhere else in the Universe. This seems to have remained an open question.

Meanwhile, the objective world continued to advance, and with the accelerated progress in the scientific field, came unimagined advances in technology - Advances to be used (and misused) in an arbitrary fashion. Reflecting upon just the last couple of Centuries, we find that mankind has indulged in so many wars and conflicts that it has ended up not only giving events names, but numbers. World War One - Following by World War Two. The first Iraq War - Followed by the Second Iraq War.

The death and destruction by war and famine have progressed to the point that some have begun to ask themselves "Truly, why are we here?" "Is it to merely kill each other off?" It would seem that our purpose-for-being is in need of some clarification.


At the moment, we are being warned that if Terrorists don't get their hands on some Nuclear weapons and do us in, Global Warming surely will. On the other hand, the Religious Fundamentalists are saying it doesn't really matter because Armageddon is only a short time off and that it will be God's way dividing us even further from each other through the anticipated Rapture - in which the chosen few will be saved and the rest will be whipped out in a Heavenly Battle carried out right here on earth.

And if that isn't enough, the "Gloom and Doom" segment of the New Agers, are assuring us that the massive earthquakes that are predicted by the latest prognosticators, will soon flip the entire planet on it's axis.

Well, I've got good some news and some bad news:

The good news is - We Create our own Reality.

The bad news is - We Create our own Reality.

So, is there Hope for Humanity in this 21st Century? If so, where will the guidance come from?  Well, one source is something called the "Lessons of Enlightenment" - Valuable information that is contained right here in this book. Also, there is a New Branch of Science on the Horizon that suggests a more sophisticated blending of the Scientific and the Spiritual. This new branch of science is known as Quantum Physics.  What this New Science has established (through the use of some very sophisticated technology) is that in experiments involving extremely small matter, the Observer can effect the behavior upon that which is being observed. Let me repeat that: The Observer can have an effect upon that which is being observed.

Why is that significant? What does it suggest? It is significant because it leads us to state of expanded awareness. It suggests that our thoughts, our beliefs, our feelings and emotions can influence time, space and what we think of as the material world. It postulates that some things exist as a wave in a state of probability and some things exist as a particle in a state of physical reality. And that we, acting as the Observer and the Creator, can decide which will be the case. We can choose from a near infinite variety of probabilities, which of these probabilities can then become a part of our physical reality.

It would seem that the power to intuit, the power to create, and the freedom for willful action, are all far greater, than we have been led to imagine. Unfortunately, it would also seem that  these qualities (intuiting, creating and the exercise of Free Will) have, through the ages, become obscured, blunted and limited by the very institutions that should have been encouraging and maintaining such qualities.

So how can we be comfortable with this expanding way of viewing our world? Well there are many clues in the Bible and even in the private writings of those who have expressed their spiritual reflections in our own time. Clues that point to this state of Expanded Awareness.

For example: The Bible tells us that we are made in the image and likeness of God. Could that mean that we are Spiritual Beings? It was Jesus who stated quite plainly: "The Father and I are One."

Might it be that He was attempting to convey to his followers (and ultimately to the rest of us) that He had reached a state of realization that He was one with His Divine Nature. Did he feel that we could reach this state of Awareness, as well?

Again, it is information in the bible that tells us that Jesus admonished his followers that those things - those miracles - that He did, they could do also. Now why would He say that? It's not likely that he intended to convey false hopes?

As Pat reminded us in his talk, it was Jesus who advised that the Kingdom of Heaven is Within - and to Seek Ye First the Kingdom of Heaven and All Things will be added unto you.

Others who have attempted to clarify these spiritual concepts, stated the same point, but in different terms: Spiritual writer Eric Butterworth attempted to convey and expanded on our understanding of our Spiritual Nature when he wrote the following:

"God is not in man like a raisin is in a bun, God is in Man like the Ocean is in a Wave." His point was that the wave and  the ocean share the same essence. If we are truly made in the image and likeness of God - as the Bible suggests - then we can NOT help but have a Spiritual Essense.

The theologian, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, put it more precisely when he reminded us that We are not Human Beings having a Spiritual experience. We are Spiritual Beings having a human experience.

So what does this tell us about relationship to  each other and to this Fluid of Creative Reality?

It tells us that we humans have total creative freedom. It tells us that Mind creates reality and that our Spiritual Nature empowers and directs the process. And it tells us that desirable physical outcomes are achieved in direct proportion to our mental liberation and our accessibility to spiritual intention.

While these pronouncements may seem to border on the grandiose, they are intended to emphasize what amounts to a clear shift in perspective. No longer need we consider ourselves little more than lowly sinners born into this world in order to struggle toward a possible opportunity of heaven bliss. Or, worse yet, consider ourselves to be little more than the end product of a chemical accident.

No longer need we look entirely outside ourselves and toward a world of contradiction and confusion to find purpose for our existence. The Kingdom of Heaven lies within - and it has always been there - waiting to be tapped.

By changing our thoughts and feelings about ourselves and neighbors, be they across the street or across the oceans, we can truly change the world in which we live.

So, why are we here? I believe We are here to come to the full realization that:

Firstly, We are Primarily Spiritual Beings. Secondly, that we are far more empowered than we have been led to believe. And Thirdly, that with that growing awareness comes  acceptance of the responsibility that goes with this expanded form of empowerment.

With the acceptance of this responsibility - of course - comes growth.

There is a difference between growing old and growing as we get older. Growing old - is a given. Growing as we get older - is an invitation we can choose to accept.           Thank you.