Bruce Charlton's Notions

I found it impossible to get a grip on the absolutely core question (for Christians) of human freedom or 'agency' (i.e. being an active, generative, creative agent) until after I had gained an imaginative understanding of divine freedom. 

It seems to be the case that demons can and do attack humans in various ways; including planting thought and desires. Once this is accepted, the question that came to my mind is: given this power - and that they are supernatural spiritual entities who are apparently immune to age and fatigue, do not need to sleep etc.; then why don't demons attack All humans All of the time? 

One answer might be - but they do! 

A fair point! However, insofar as this is the case; the attacks are often subtle and indirect: rather than full-on attempts to break the will and possess people. These do seem to be unusual, if not always exceptional... I have heard that there have been times and places when outright demonic attacks are common, other times when they are relatively rare.

Another thing: the idea that demons can 'get into the heads' of human beings would seem to be terrifying - almost paralyzingly so; given that, no matter how vigilant we try to be - surely our guard must be down from time to time.

We are bound to fail sooner or later...  

Even more fundamentally; could a loving creator God really put his children into such a world? Surely there must also be defences and deterrents against demonic attack... 

What I am working towards is that the ability of demons to attack humans by getting inside their thinking cannot be the whole story. 

There must be countervailing forces - to make sense of God's motivations and of our own observations and experience; there must be other factors - which work in the opposite direction. 

One such is presumably 'defences' - the most important of which seems to be that demons must be 'invited-in'. They cannot force their way into an unwilling soul. 

Of course, this is only a partial defence - given the evil in Men's hearts, and the subtlety and deviousness of demonic temptation. Yet it does perhaps explain why all-out demonic attack is as rare as it is. 

If each Man is an impregnable castle, and demons can only enter by having the gate opened; then an unambiguous and obvious attack is the least likely to succeed.    

But there is another factor which I believe is operative in protecting us against demonic invasion - and this one seems to be neglected. 

This is that when a demonic attack fails: the demons are weakened and hurt. If demons attack and their attack is repulsed; they become worse-off than if they had never attacked. 

This means that as well as defence, there is also an active deterrent against demonic attack. 

We are not only defended against them by an impregnable castle - the gate of which must voluntarily be opened; but also every time They penetrate the caste defences and are beaten-back - then the demonic powers suffer a damaging defeat; perhaps a permanently damaging defeat.

Perhaps there is a law: The stronger the demonic attack which is thwarted; the more damaging and hurtful is the defeat. Therefore, most attacks will be partial, indirect, deniable - so that failure would be less hurtful. 

In different words; if demons tempt us, and we succumb but then recognize our sin and choose to repent - then this is a severe blow against the demonic cause. 

If a demon plants a thought in our minds, but we then recognize its provenance, realize it is of evil origin and reject it for that reason... This sequence is more than just a defense - it is an active blow against the powers of evil. 

Or when someone joins their personal creative imagination or activities with divine creation; that inflicts damage on the side of Satan. 

I think this kind of inner activity is one way in which much of the spiritual war of this world is conducted. And we need to remember that the power of repentance is infinitely renewable and of total power against sin. This power of repentance came to Men by the work of Jesus Christ.   

The above scenario suggests that if extreme or overt demonic attack becomes common; this is probably due either to extreme weakness and susceptibility on the side of humans so that their victory seems almost certain. 

Or it may result from reckless desperation on the side of demons - who have been driven to risk the painful and weakening consequences of spiritual defeat.  

Such factors may explain why at some particular places and times strong demonic attacks seem to have been more common. 

Some have reported that here-and-now is one of those places and times...

Thinking affects the world - just as we knew it did when we were young children. 

We knew then that thoughts come into our mind from outside our heads, and that our own thinking was known-by and affected the world outside our head. 

We knew then that our fear could attract the attention of that-which-is-feared; and indeed could conjure-up that-which-is-feared. Thinking about a bad thing could 'make it happen' - so we tried not to do it. 

(The child experiences this being-part-of-the-world spontaneously and passively; yet it is this basic understanding of 'participation' which the Romantic Christian aims to recover consciously and by choice.)  

Our thinking is a part of the world, and this is the reason why sin is evil; why our 'feelings' can harm the world. 

The modern materialist cannot comprehend why what he thinks or feels 'in the privacy of my own mind' could or should be of any concern to anybody else - and that God 'would not be interested' in such trivial matters as his personal attitudes, fears or desires. 

But the world Just Is Made so that our thinking is part of it. Thinking is Not confined to our brain - the idea that thinking is a free-spinning cog, detached from 'reality' is an incoherent delusion.

(...As Owen Barfield explained in Saving the Appearances, 1965).

Therefore, when we (for instance) experience a powerful fear of what the demon-controlled global totalitarian establishment might do to us (as spontaneously happened to me this morning, shortly after waking) - we are both committing the sin of despair and also making that bad outcome more likely. 

We make the bad outcome more likely by lending the creative power of our imagination to an evil world picture. By yielding-to despair, we take the side of Satan; and lend him material assistance by our spiritual activity. 

And this is why such thoughts come to mind. Since our minds are not cut-off from the world, evil thoughts can be put-into them by evil spirits - as was always acknowledged in the past. 

But the flip side of this frightening reality is that every 'defeat' of evil thoughts in our mind (by our will) has beneficial external effects - which is why we do not get evil thoughts all of the time: defeat wounds Satan. Every repudiation of sin somewhat improves the world

All good thoughts, aligned with God's will, tends to make good futures more likely.   

Thus we ought to recognize fear and despair as sins, and inwardly reject them - make the inward affirmation that we do not want to sin. 

This act of will (of free will) is called repentance; and it has the effect of transferring our creative aid from Satan to God (a double benefit!). 

By repentance (recognition and rejection of sin) we have thus rejected the world picture being imposed upon us by demonic powers and their servants (by all means They can muster), we have made an act of affiliation to divine creation, and we have redirected our soul's effort towards God.

However, this identification and repudiation of sin, and commitment to Good, needs to be distinguished from its perversion as 'the power of positive thinking': the idea that we can 'get what we want' if we want it hard enough. 

Positive thinking is about imposing our personal will upon the world - getting what we want from the world; and this is an extremely different matter from willing our allegiance to God's ongoing work of divine creating; extremely different from taking the side of Good in the spiritual war of these times.  

The positive thinker would - like a Romantic Christian - also try to reject fear and despair; but he would do thins because they are negative emotions that make him feel miserable. The positive thinker is not rejecting fear and despair because these are sins, nor because they aid the attainment of a more complete and extreme demonic anti-creation than we already have. 

Neither would the positive thinker be making a commitment to God's plan for reality. He is instead trying to impose his own plan on reality - and this existential selfishness plays directly-into Satan's hands, is immediately woven-into the demonic anti-creation that opposes God. 

Both positive thinking and repentance/ affiliation are - in a broad sense - concerned with 'getting what we personally want'. To the modern secular mind this means that one is as good (or bad) as the other - merely different forms of self-gratification... 

Nonetheless, there is a distinction between types of self-gratification in terms of their assumed, ultimate metaphysical context. 

The distinction is between a secular attitude of aiming at what provides gratification in this mortal life - on the metaphysical assumption that this mortal life is believed to be the only life. Or, by contrast, a Christian attitude of regarding this finite mortal life as followed by an eternal post-mortal life; with this our mortal life gaining meaning from its purpose. 

The Christian purpose of this mortal life is assumed to be 'educational': we are intended to learn from this life 'lessons' of importance to the eternity which follows.     

A Romantic Christian does indeed want to reject fear, despair, resentment and many other unpleasant feelings; and instead to think positively. 

And repentance does have a positive power. To recognize and repent a sin is to starve it of the oxygen it would otherwise obtain from being regarded as a valid emotion. 

But the aim of thinking positively goes beyond mortal life into Heaven; and the the ultimate 'positive' is seen as our personal, chosen, active participation in God's creation.

 

I think it is becoming evident that the traditional conception of 'a Christian Life' - which was essentially about obedience to God's commandments - has become inadequate. Has become, indeed, harmful: evil.  

For me, this has been brought to the fore by the fact of so many active, devout and observant Christians joining (showing all appearance of enthusiasm) with the demonically-evil Global Establishment core strategies of birdemic-peck healthism, CO2-climatism, and the leftism of antiracism and sexual revolution. 

Since early 2020 there has been an unprecedented collapse of all the major Christian churches partly imposed, but willingly embraced and even amplified by the church leadership (I hesitate to call them 'priests' or 'pastors') - and blandly accepted by most of the laity. 

Yet the colossal scale of this church collapse seems apparently to have passed unnoticed, is barely discussed, strenuously denied.

I interpret this as solid evidence that the 'model' of traditional Christianity, the model of what constituted a good church, a good Christian - was profoundly inadequate, fundamentally mistaken. 

Because we have on the one hand Satan triumphant, blatant, obvious... The establishment of a global, a totalitarian 'world order' that is busily engaged in wholesale, accelerating, multi-pronged spiritual corruption; via all forms of social organization and institution... 

And on the other hand, not just a comprehensive failure to discern this massive fact; but many positive attitudes and acts of support for this strategic worldwide scheme of damnation. 

In other words, it is clearly possible, indeed easy, for someone to be a dedicated traditional Christian - an active church-goer, whose life is in accordance with the rules of living: one who studies and knows scripture, knows theology, spends significant time in in earnest prayer, meets with other Christians to study scripture and edifying books, does good works etc etc... 

All this and more; and yet to fail the biggest and simplest task of of spiritual discernment - and thus to become an agent of totalitarian evil, a dupe of the devil. 

In other words, as of 2021 it has become commonplace for 'exemplary Christians' not merely to comply with the demands of evil; but to join the side of evil in the spiritual war of this world. 

This proves, to my satisfaction, that the traditional concept of 'being a Christian' is fatally inadequate; and that something more and/or different is necessary as a matter of extreme and personal urgency. 

The simultaneous and overall failure of so many different denominations and types of Christianity is evidence that they all lacked what was necessary - and doubling down on old notions, or adding more to the list of externally imposed practices and rituals, will be useless or counterproductive. 

What then - in general terms - should Christians do, how should Christians aim to live, in the world of 2021?

The answer would appear to be related to the concept of 'creation', active and chosen personal human creative activity: so long as 'creativity' be properly understood. 

As Francis Berger has recently described well: each Man's role as a Christian here-and-now (however different it may have been in other times and places) requires a personal commitment to think and act creatively in-harmony-with divine creation. 

This is necessary because 'the world' is already and necessarily being co-created by Men - that is, we our-selves supply the concepts by which the chaotic perceptual phenomena become knowledge. 

There is no knowable 'objective' world out there and independent of Man's consciousness: We are all of us, all the time, unavoidably co-making, co-creating this world. 

The huge problem is that this is co-creating process is mostly unconscious, and that many Christians deny it; or even regard the idea of individual Men actively creating as pride-full, reckless; regard co-creating as arrogantly evil-motivated. 

But since co-creation by Man is real and unavoidable, this leaves the field open to Satan. 

Thus modern Man is continually co-creating the world while unaware or in denial of the fact; and this creative activity has therefore been increasingly hijacked by the powers of evil; such that Mankind's co-creative activity is now substantially aligned with the Satanic agenda. 

I don't just mean that creative people (in the obvious domains such as visual arts, writing, music etc) are overwhelmingly working for the Satantic agenda - this is obvious enough, but merely the tip of an iceberg which extends to all of our experienced-and-known life. 

The major harm - a deep, wide and pervasive corruption - is in the actual observations, experiences and understandings of the mass of Men. 

Because all our knowledge is being-made, moment-by-moment, with our own creative input; and because this co-creative input of each Man is denied by most Christians and has been externally-diverted by evil powers; therefore Modern Man is living life seen through Satanic Spectacles. 

Modern Man does not perceive obvious evils - because his knowledge of the world has been unconsciously formed (co-created) using externally-derived evil concepts - without his knowledge.  

Modern Man adopts attitudes and performs acts that are evil - under the impression that they are good; because he is habitually making his world passively, using Satanically-inverted values. 

Modern Man sees good as evil; because his systems of evaluation are constructed with concepts that he has absorbed from The World; and the institutions of The World (the whole world) have been brought into overall alignment with the vast demonic strategy. 

Each Christian absolutely needs to recognize that he is co-creating The World. It is a lethal error to suppose that God's creation lies outside of himself and that a Christian needs merely to conform to that external reality. 

That whole attitude is wrong. 

The Christian should recognize that he personally is contributing to creating the actual world; he should strive to become conscious of his own creating; and he should make the conscious choice to align his own inevitable moment-by-moment co-creating of reality with God's primary and pre-existing creation. 

The key words are 'conscious' and choose. 

First we need to be aware of what is-happening; then we make our choice: 

Do we choose to ally-with God's real creation, or do we choose to ally with The System?... A System which is a product of Satanic, externally-imposed, passively-absorbed, this-worldly concepts.    

Consciousness and choice are things that can only be done by each person, one at a time. 

They are our responsibility, mine and yours - and (as of 2021) any avoidance of this individual responsibility is a de facto decision to join with the side of evil. 

But, on the plus side; if we can become aware of co-creating and make the right decision of its alliance, and keep making it; our activity of co-creating reality will 'materially-assist' God's creative plans for this world: assist God immediately and personally, but also in the long-term and generally - by divine providence - in all kinds of unpredictable and unobservable ways. 

Note added: Our ongoing co-creation of this world is taken from what Owen Barfield terms "figuration", in his book Saving the Appearances - and this book (if studied with care) is highly relevant to the above argument and our current condition. However, Barfield does not make an explicit link to the spiritual war, nor to our conscious choices of co-creation/ figuration being that of picking sides in that war - consequently, the argument of StA can (misleadingly) seem rather abstract, complicated, or even 'post-modern' (in its emphasis on choice). The spiritual distinction of God or Satan is implicit in StA, but I could wish that Barfield had made this core aspect clearer and simpler. 

We live in a post-modern, post-scientific age of incoherence; where we demand two simultaneous incompatibles: 

1. That reality ought to be subordinated to subjective consciousness - i.e. that reality conforms to the prevalent, official, mainstream, global leftist ideology. 

If apparent-reality does not conform to ideology - it is re-defined as not-reality.  

 2. That reality is independent of what we think about it: therefore science is (continues to be) dominant. 

As in I/We follow The Science! 

The apparent contradiction is removed because 'The Science' - that is, the kind of science which is agreed by The System to define reality - is now wholly a part of The System. 

And The System is also the source of ideology. 

The System, on the one hand, claims to be derived-from and driven-by The Science - while continually (and at every level) shaping The Science. 

The System is reality, it is truth (The Science) and it is virtue (the official ideology).

When 'objective reality' (as defined by official science) is part of the same System that regards ideology as primary - then there can be no conflict between science and ideology. 

The System is itself reality - because it defines both the ideology and The Science from which that ideology claims to be derived. This 'works' because it is The System which continually creates agreement/ non-contradiction between the ideology and the science; and this is done (done on an almost daily basis in recent months) by continually re-shaping what counts as science into compatibility with ideology.   

But because The System is bigger than science, and includes science; it is the 'dog' of ideology which is 'wagging the tail' of science.    

However we, as individuals, continue to be subjective. That is; we continue to experience The System as external to our-selves. 

Our consciousness is not within The System - and never can be. 

We can deny or suppress this knowledge - but the fact remains that this separateness is implicit in the experienced fact that we our-selves are required to conform to The System; which requirement is experienced as the need to be changing; the requirement frequently and rapidly to be changing our consciousness.

(Variously called 'consciousness raising', or addressing of 'implicit bias' - meaning that individual consciousness is recurrently falling out-of-step with the 'reality' of The System.) 

Thus we are frequently aware of a 'need' - a demand - to change our-selves in line with The System: and indeed this need/demand is increasingly pressed upon us; with propaganda and manipulations coming from all sides in the world of public discourse; and by requirements to subject ourselves to explicit indoctrination based on the assumption that We All (as individuals) Need To Change. 

From the perspective of The System it is We - as individuals - that are The Problem. 

It is We, as individuals, who have-to change our thinking: for instance in relation to the birdemic-peck, climate, antiracism, sexuality etc. We need to keep-up!

This flows from the base assumption that it is The System which is true reality (because of The Science) - and it is our personal subjectivity (outside The System, as our subjectivity necessarily is) which is unreal, false; and - if subjectivity fails to conform itself to The System - evil; because evil is that which opposes The System.

Opposing The System is evil because The System is the source of ideology-morality. 

The System tells us that our thinking and decision-making ought-to-be ('must' be) within The System - and, since this can only be chosen; we are each called-upon to make that overall choice: the choice of Yes to The System - or No. 

As of 2021 - Yes or No to The System is the foundational choice upon which all other choices depend. 

It is a choice. 

Therefore the great externally-imposed imperative - the only moral/ ethical imperative of these times, one that we all experience here-and-now, as of 2021; is that it is your job and my job and everybody's job - now and for evermore, over and again - to keep making that choice. 

We must: Stay With The System!

DANE-GELD

It is always a temptation to an armed and agile nation,
To call upon a neighbour and to say:
"We invaded you last night - we are quite prepared to fight,
Unless you pay us cash to go away."

And that is called asking for Dane-geld,
And the people who ask it explain
That you’ve only to pay ’em the Dane-geld
And then you’ll get rid of the Dane!

It is always a temptation to a rich and lazy nation,
To puff and look important and to say:
"Though we know we should defeat you, we have not the time to meet you.
We will therefore pay you cash to go away."

And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
But we’ve proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane.

It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
For fear they should succumb and go astray,
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say:

"We never pay any one Dane-geld,
No matter how trifling the cost,
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that plays it is lost!"

Rudyard Kipling - 1911

*

The mainstream political Right (conservative, republican, libertarian etc.) spends far too much time and effort (in practice, all of its time and effort) on discussing and pursuing tactics - in seeking the best battle-ground, in preparing 'a hill to die on', in taking one step back in hopes of sometime later taking two steps forward.

...Short-term tactics justifiable only by long-term strategy. Dane-geld is advocated on the basis that it wins a space of relief during which there can be re-grouping and re-arming, and preparation for the big battle later.

Yet, somehow the hill-to-die-on types never quite get-round to completing their strategy: the time for for retreat is always now, the time for battle is never quite right.

The enemy is paid-off, sure; but the hoped-for re-building (supposed to happen during the negotiated peace) somehow doesn't happen...

Too much Dane-geld, too often. And in the end nothing but Dane-geld.



The trouble is that paying Dane-geld is not just losing ground, Dane-geld is a transfer: it weakens the payer and strengthens the receiver. Dane-geld is counter-productive, by adversely shifting the balance of power.

The "Biggles" (christened James Bigglesworth) series of books were published by Captain WE Johns between 1932 and 1970 (two years after his death). These were my staple literary diet between ages about 11-13 (until displaced following the impact of reading Lord of the Rings); so I have considerable affection for them. 

Biggles was an aviator, and later an 'air police' adventurer, and I followed him from his beginnings in the First World War as a Sopwith Camel pilot, through the Second World War (when he flew Spitfires). 

Indeed, I believe Biggles was the only fighter pilot who saw active service in both wars [not actually true - see comments below], a fact which was helped by the fact he never got any older. I then continued on with his later (Indiana Jones-type) international missions, of a more crime-fighting nature. 

Of course, I not not read all the Biggles books, nor even half of them - because there were apparently nearly 100 novels! - but I did read the first (The Camels are Coming, 1932) and very nearly the last (Biggles and the Little Green God, 1969)... essentially I read everything I could find in the library, borrow from friends, afford to buy, or got as presents.  

Recently, I bought a trio of Biggles's earliest WWI novels at a bargain price, from a secondhand bookshop, because my wife said she would not mind trying one as our bedtime reading-aloud book. 

This may sound a strange choice for a married couple; but we have found that childrens' books tend to read aloud better, and their short chapters fit with the relatively short timescale before sleep supervenes. 

Also my wife has become interested-in, and knowledgeable-about, the history of the two world wars over the past several years - albeit remaining shockingly ignorant of what I regard as their most interesting aspect: the aeroplanes! 

(As an extreme example: she once mixed-up the identifications of a Spitfire and a Lancaster on a jigsaw puzzle. Yes, I know...!)

We started with The Camels are Coming. This derives from a series of short stories published in childrens' magazines of the mid-war era. 

WE Johns was himself a WWI pilot; and he describes in the introduction that he is using Biggles and his friends as the fictional protagonists of what were real incidents and adventures. Some of which happened to him; but most of were taken from accounts of other pilots he knew - or from gossip among the pilots.  

Consequently, the book has considerable documentary interest. For instance, as well has having a lot about the 'machines' (aircraft); it is written using uncompromising RFC (Royal Flying Corps) slang. For instance, anti-aircraft fire is 'archie', observation balloons are 'sausages', the Fokker Triplanes are called 'tripehounds', and of course the Germans are usually 'Huns'. 

This, either on the assumption that their boy readers would already know this - or that they would be astute enough to learn as they read. My modern edition has numerous footnotes to explain these terms; but as a kid, I simply picked-up their meanings from context. 

I found myself becoming fascinated all over again by the extraordinary world of the pilots of that era; and my wife too got engaged by all this. Thus we moved-on to read Biggles Learns to Fly covering our hero's early years, and are currently working-through Biggles of the Camel Squadron which covers the end of the war

Indeed I got so interested that I read several real pilot's memoirs - both from the first and the second wars; and indeed, these kinds of books had also formed a staple of my early teen reading: I recall reading the accounts of or by Douglas Bader, Ginger Lacey, and 'Cats Eyes' Cunningham the night fighter pilot.

(...Whose exploits British propaganda explained as due to eating plenty of carrots, which they said helped Cunningham to see in the dark. In truth; his success was made possible by secret on-board radar. But carrots were not rationed and could be grown anywhere - so the government wanted to encourage their consumption.) 

People die in these books, and quite frequently. This was a war, of course, and the RFC pilots had a staggering high mortality rate - especially in their first weeks; mostly due to very unreliable 'machines' and the gross lack of training. 

But in addition, at some points, almost half the pilots were killed in training - even before going to The Front. They would be sent into battle after only a few hours of solo flying - which is rather like someone who has just passed their driving test participating in a Formula One Grand Prix. 

Experienced pilots lived much longer; but even so most of the best WWI 'aces' of both sides (with many 'kills' to their credit) were sooner or later shot-down, or died from a machine malfunction. For instance even 'The Red Baron' von Richthofen - with 80 victories - was killed. This happened during a dogfight with Canadian airmen (but who actually fired the fatal bullet that penetrated his chest is unsure). 

Part of it was that the WWI aircraft were slow especially the two-men machines from early in the war that c. 70 mph was common (albeit this had been doubled in the best fighters from 1918). So they were very vulnerable to machine-gun fire - or, when flying low, even to rifle fire from ground troops. 

The pilots had no parachutes - and very little effort was made to develop suitable parachutes. 

Indeed, (as happened again with Bomber Command and the Luftwaffe in WWII) the authorities took a shockingly long time to learn that good pilots were a precious and rate-limiting 'commodity'; and cost far more than aircraft.    

So, our Biggles experiment has proved a major success! I can now see that the books are of a modest literary quality; and that Biggles himself is a rather unappealing character - because he tends to be very irritable and - under stress - violently bad tempered. He is also prone to making sarcastic and derogatory comments. 

But Biggles is surrounded by rather more genial chaps (and they certainly are 'chaps' - officers from the upper classes) such as his cousin and wing-man, Algy and his frenemy 'Wilks' Wilkinson. 

I liked Henry 'The Professor' and maths expert - but he seems, at this point, to have 'bought it' and 'gone West' - i.e. died.

But of course Biggles is brave and loyal, and a top-notch pilot who shoots down vast numbers of enemy 'machines'; so none of that really matters!

One of the good, positive things about these evil-dominated end times is that - probably for the first time since the ascension of Christ - the simplicity of 'being a Christian' has become evident. 

This has happened because the core business of this mortal life of Man is being thrust upon us willy-nilly, like it or not. 

The World is becoming more evil, and anyone who desires to stand against this invasive evil finds himself with ever-less worldly (and societal) assistance. The erstwhile support of the Christian-named churches has fallen-away and indeed (mostly) switched sides. 

True information about Christianity, and true concepts with-which to understand information, is almost impossibly difficult to find among the truly immense quantity of disinformation, and varieties of distortion. 

One of the (many) adverse effects of the churches is a combination of distraction and misplaced emphasis. So many Christians are expending all their (already too limited) attention and efforts on secondary or even irrelevant matters that have near-zero significance for the situation of people here and now - such that they do not help the Christian, and tend to block his ability to discover help. 

The consequence is a stripping-away of a great deal that has been regarded as of core importance to 'being a Christian' - and the emergence of a stark and (potentially) saving simplicity. 

This is a glorious phenomenon to behold! Individuals from all sorts of backgrounds of tradition and denomination (or none) are finding the path and finding direct and personal strength in their Christian faith - and finding too that they recognize each other with startling clarity and certainty. 

Arguments and 'evidence' are falling away to be replaced by a direct-knowledge of what is Good and Necessary...

Amidst the rampant triumph of purposive evil - this marvelous Great Compensation is at work! 

William Wildblood has provided a characteristically lucid explanation of why 'neutrality' with respect to the spiritual war between evil and those who have chosen to follow Jesus Christ is no longer an option. 

Francis Berger gives a detailed, and personal, analysis of the shift from a world in 'lockdown' to a world of 'lockout' - where it is planned that those who do not comply will (incrementally) be excluded from society. 

WmJas Tychonievich takes-up one of my posts about Antichrist from a few days ago, re-explains it more clearly - and develops an ingenious and witty analogy with the shift from the heliocentric (Sun-centred - God-centred), to the geocentric (earth-centred - this-worldly) to the current moon-centred 'lunacy' of the birdemic-peck plan. 

In my time working in the UK universities and National Health Service - these functions were brought under managerial control, and integrated into The System which (since early 2020) is now global. 

The almost complete surrender of power by academics and doctors happened almost entirely without coercion. Why? 

Essentially, deeply, due to the lack of motivation and courage from living as godless-expedient hedonists (i.e. regarding mortal life as wholly about 'utility'), on the basic of incoherent (increasingly inverted) Leftist values. 

Lacking any positive transcendent values (truth, beauty, virtue, coherence...); modern people, especially Westerners, are easier to control than any group I have heard of throughout history. 

But how did this control operate proximately? The answer could be termed pre-emptive compliance. 

The management (whether national or local) would announce what was going to happen - some new scheme to strip autonomy from academics and subordinate teaching, research, scholarship under administrative control; or some new, extra, unpaid and harmful bureaucratic tasks...

And always the mass reaction was 1. to assume that this was inevitable and that 'resistance is futile'; and 2. therefore to comply instantly and with feigned enthusiasm. 

There was essentially zero mass resistance, yet those individuals who did refuse to comply were - for many years - left alone; showing that mass resistance would likely have been effective. 

In other words - the mass of people responded pre-emptively to threats: threats were made, and people obeyed... Obeyed even before threats were implemented, obeyed even when threats were not implemented! 

Scaled-up this has been the story of The West over the past several generations. Coercion to enforce totalitarian tyranny was very seldom needed or used, because compliance was automatic and instant - despite that there has been very widespread cynicism concerning the motivations of the bureaucracy and politicians whose instructions were being so slavishly obeyed. 

This is a measure of our spiritual malaise - the West has quietly, obediently and pre-emptively complied with each step of a now System which covers all nations and regions, and claims authority over all aspects of human existence including family, church, and a Man's private thoughts - i.e. a global totalitarianism. 

And there has been extremely little need for coercion, because the world has complied automatically and instantly; which is evidence of an extreme level of human demotivation due to gross insufficiency of any inner and positive convictions that might provide a basis for, even conceptualized a need for, resistance.

That is the point. We are not seeing merely a global 'failure' of resistance; but a global failure to recognize any need for resistance: that is, a failure to have any reason for resistance of a totalitarianism which is evil both intrinsically (in that universal control is of-itself evil) and also evil explicitly, in its agenda.  

Our spiritual malaise is therefore much, much worse than most people seem to realize. People talk as if what was lacking is means to resist evil (they usually mean some kind of organization); but the much deeper problem is a lack even of the basic desire to resist evil. 

And this stems from a false basic understanding of the nature of reality - false metaphysical assumptions about the world - consequence of generations of apostasy from Christianity combined with a pervasive 'materialism' that by-now permeates traditional Christianity.

If, on the other hand; you are personally motivated Not to comply - because you have strong positive motivations with which compliance interferes and/or because you regard totalitarianism as evil by nature and/or intent - then you do not need a plan for non-compliance. 

One simply does not comply - and wait to see what (if anything) happens. Sometimes nothing happens.

If there are threats (and there will be) they are ignored. Often they lead to nothing. So one waits to see if the threats really are going to be implemented - sometimes they are not.

If the threats are implemented - which is relatively rare, because resource-consuming; one may still refuse to comply.

Or one may delay complaince: comply as late as possible (to make Them make extra effort - sometimes they will not)

One may continue to disobey except when specifically told to obey - that is: refuse to self-police... make Them do it (so They must expend effort); behaviour is adjusted reactively, not pre-emptively.

Evil plans and threats are cheap hence innumerable - an accurate response is that each will only happen when it has happened.

And even then evil will only continue happening either due to continued effort and resource expenditure from those who want it to happen - or else because of the chosen surrender to evil of pre-emptive compliance and self-policing. 

In sum - resistance to evil has many levels and degrees - most are 'passive' (a matter of non-compliance); most are about delaying in hope of unforeseen providential assistance, not all require heroism and some at least are possible even to the most timid. 

Enough delay, from enough people, for the right motivations; will provide God with everything He needs to make a cohesive, positive, alternative, better future. 

God helps those who help themselves is both true, and exclusive: God helps only those who help themselves. 

If individual people do not make choices, for good and against evil - then God cannot pursue good ends in this mortal world. But when some people do know and choose the side of God; then by the invisible working of providence (possible to The Creator) then an unknowably great deal can be achieved by combining and sequencing these individual acts. 

Any individual who is motivated to do good or resist evil, will find sufficient discernment and some courage. And then each such act can be woven-with other such acts, by God, into a divine plan of scope far beyond the wit of Man. 

But what all require is motivation - and motivation is based on an understanding of reality that identifies and distinguishes between good and evil, and the capacity to discern this for oneself (not relying on 'authority' to inform you) - it requires a perspective that we are each responsible for our own choices, and that individual choice is of genuine significance, and makes-a-difference.  

In other words, resistance needs a transcendental perspective - one that is larger than this mortal life; and it also needs a personal perspective - that regards an individual's as able to make choices and those choices as having cosmic significance. 

I don't know of anything other than Christianity - and even then only some kinds of Christianity - that can (even in principle) lead to such a combination of personal and transcendental motivations; and therefore sustain even the desire to resist totalitarian evil.   

Independent of its musical quality; there is a fair bit of classical music since the later 19th century that communicates to me an atmosphere of evil. 

Before this era, it seems either that music lacked the ability to communicate evil (due to its much greater formality and lesser subjectivity), or perhaps composers were not evil at the times when their music was actually being composed (because genius itself to some significant entails an alignment with divine creation). 

Evil in classical music is an aspect of the phenomenon of 'the evil genius' which Ed Dutton and I discuss in our book The Genius Famine, and which Ed has gone-on to elaborate in his subsequent work. 

Since classical music does not operate in the same way as prose, the way that evil comes-through is various - but I will list three of the best composers whose work I regard as evil in this musical way: Mahler, Stravinsky, Carl Orff. 

As I say, this is substantially a different matter from aesthetic appreciation. With Mahler, however, I find the taint of rottenness too strong to allow me fully to enjoy anything of his. But I can appreciate Stravinsky's Rite of Spring; and Orff's Carmina Burana is one of my favourite 20th century pieces - to which I have listed scores of times. 

But I was listening this morning to Orff's 'follow-up' cantatas - Catulli Carmina and Trionfo di Afrodite (which I have both known for over 40 years); and in them (despite thrilling musical moments) I rapidly become overwhelmed by the evil, to a Mahlerian degree. In the end they make me feel so dysphoric, that I cannot really enjoy them. 

Evil 'in' music (not just 'verbally', in terms of the subject matter - as with Richard Strauss's Der Rosenkavalier; nor in terms of the music's non-musical associations, eg. with youth cults or wicked regimes) is an interesting phenomenon that I have not seen discussed - probably because most people cannot recognize evil, and would not acknowledge it if they did). 

I wonder whether readers have experienced anything similar?

The Antichrist phenomenon (and I regard it as essentially a phenomenon rather than a person) is discourse that is mostly-Christian but where the core assumptions behind the discourse are anti-Christian - so that no matter how many Christian words or concepts, or how much Christian symbolism and ritual, are deployed - the end result is in service of Satan.

'The' Antichrist (as a person) is envisaged as pretending to be a representative and champion of Christ (or perhaps even pretending to be Christ himself) - while covertly working against the salvation of men. 

It seems to me that we are beyond the Antichrist stage in our culture; since anyone now pretending to represent Christ would have no social or political appeal or traction; is indeed himself regarded as 'evil'. Because, by now, our core value system has been very thoroughly inverted - with genuine truth, beauty and virtue officially, legally and in mass media regarded as their opposites - and vice versa.    

The era of Antichrist was therefore some time ago, back in the twentieth century, in the first post-Christian generations who still valued Christian values. 

Since then, most people value one or several Leftist values as their core and bottom line beliefs - values such as socialism, feminism, sexual revolution/ 'liberation', environmentalism (especially 'climate'), antiracism, and (especially since 2020)  health.  

The phenomenon I am calling Reciprocal Antichrist can be seen in relation to health - by which I mean specifically that abstraction termed 'public health' which is distanced from your health and my health; but is referenced to statistical summaries and analyses of 'health'-measures; and top-down assertions regarding 'well-being'.

The Antichrist aspect was that - for many people - health - specifically public health - became the primary value. This was most strongly represented by the World Health Organization, which is part of the United Nations - which is, since before its inception, intended by the globalist ultra-wealthy and powerful to become the World Government. 

Therefore, healthism is, in practice, 'public health'-ism. 

Thus the original Antichrist of 'health' was the officially-sanctioned statistical representation of officially defined health measures - for various sized groups of people, but ultimately The World. The ultimate goal of this Antichrist phenomenon was thus the greatest health of The World (and officially defined). 

So 'healthism' was an Antichrist phenomenon - but with the birdemic, we see this becoming the reciprocal of its former self. There has been an Antichrist of the Antichrist of healthism. 

Thus, in the name of Global Public Health, claiming itself to be "healthism", and using the 'words, symbols and rituals' of the primacy of health; we are getting an Anti-health movement. 

The first step was re-organizing global health services (indeed, the global economy and social living) to focus almost-exclusively on a single and minor attributed-cause of disease - and thereby (inevitably and severely) worsening overall health. 

Then, as a second phase; by introducing an unneccessary, ineffective and in fact net-harmful intervention (i.e. 'the peck' - actually not a 'the', but instead a variety of loosely-defined, occult and open-endedly-evolving injected agents, serially administered over the lifespan) - and with the explicit intention of compelling this peck upon the entire human species - repeatedly and permanently 

Yet, the peck is argued and implemented with a large range of 'healthist' terminology and rationalization - as if it was indeed an agent of better health. 

Therefore if we regard healthism as a first-time Antichrist phenomenon; then the birdemic has ushered-in a a second and Anti-Antichrist phenomenon - which inverts into a reciprocal the already-inverted pseudo-equations of healthism. 

With each Antichrist phenomenon there is a reduction and a distortion of the original - so that while health is indeed one of the 'Goods' of Christianity (as shown in the miraculous healings of Jesus, albeit a secondary Good being subordinated to the spiritual); health-ism replaced the personal understanding of health with a grossly-simplified and -distorted statistical summary of quantitative measurements of the health of many persons.

This means that when healthism is inverted by a further Antichrist move; we are Not returned to what we had before the first inversion; because what is being secondly-inverted was already a distorted sample; and because the second inversion involves yet further simplification of healthism (from measures of overall-health to a single disease) and distortion (by subordination of all other diseases to the birdemic). 

All the above helps explain why there is such deep contradiction at work in the world, and so many and expanding lies; and how no sense can be made of the world of public discourse. 

Because things are even worse than the above description - since there are parallel processes at work with socialism, feminism, antiracism, environmentalism etc. 

These were already Antichrist phenomena, and they are now being subjected to further Antichrist inversions by further abstraction, reductionism and distortion: such that Reciprocal Antichrist socialism now destroys the actual working class; Reciprocal Antichrist feminism destroys actual women; Reciprocal Antichrist antiracism destroys actual individuals of the races it purports to privilege; Reciprocal Antichrist environmentalism destroys the actual environment etc...

All while justifying their own activities with statistical summaries and analyses of officially-defined-as-valid indirect and proxy measures of groups - local, national and ultimately global. 

It all sounds terribly complex and confusing - yet it is all really very simple when looked at from the spiritual war between Good and evil. 

It is a matter of discerning which side is which, and taking the side of God, Good and divine creation. 

And this anyone can do: if he really wants to do it... 

It is that 'wanting' that is lacking.

I have often reviewed 'esoteric' spiritual teachings from the last decades of the twentieth century - and even among those that I would regard as genuinely Christian, and which there is considerable insight and wisdom; there is an recurrent error. 

And that error is to make spiritual generalizations about the spiritual uplifting of the generality of people in the world. Purported plans and schemes about how the mass of people can and should be raised to a higher spiritual level - perhaps presaging the believed-in 'second coming' of Jesus Christ. 

In other words; the spiritual teachings tend to become political - albeit a spiritual kind of politics. And indeed, this usually seems to the the major motivation. A person has some kind of (partly valid) insight or inspiration, and then makes it into some kind of a system by-which (it is claimed) God intends to raise-up many or most Men before the longed-for second coming. 

Now, despite believing that we are in the End Times; I do Not believe in the second coming of Jesus Christ for reasons I have set out before - I regard this as a post-Jesus error. So, naturally I regard it as mistaken to reason in this way.  

But with the events since early 2020 to hammer-home the message; it seems ever clearer to me that we are supposed to set-aside mass considerations with respect to salvation and the spiritual war in general; we are supposed to stop being political.  

This is very difficult, because most people are more deeply convinced of their political convictions than of anything else. Yet, I think it is being made evident to us that to be political is intrinsically and necessarily to ally oneself with the powers of evil. 

As the months go by, and it becomes undeniable that all powerful social institutions are now on the side of Satan; the only path open to Christians gets to be that of working from one-self (and those one loves, directly and personally). 

...In brief: to commit oneself to the side of God, Good and the divine creation and to follow Jesus Christ - and leave the rest to God. 

We need to develop a real faith that this is what God wants us to do; and that insofar as we can achieve it in our-selves - then God will work through us. 

Furthermore; that God can, will and does work through the 'group' of human individuals who are thus aligned: God will do this and we ought not to be interfering. 

Any and all individuals who are (at any particular time) aligned with Good; are-being deployed for the Good of the world by God in invisible and unknown ways. This is happening all the time, and it is why Good remains undefeated, and continues to win victories - despite overwhelming global demonic-serving power versus the apparent worldly-powerlessness of real Christians. 

But these are not 'political' victories, to be read-about in the mass media or official announcements; they are spiritual victories - and often directed at the post-mortal salvation of particular people who are open to them and desire them. 

In a nutshell; I believe that we are intended to work from our own actual individual situation - regarding this mortal life as a time for recognizing and learning from the experiences God offers us; and having a real, practical and courageous faith to leave the large-scale social organizing to God's creative work behind the scenes. 

The old term is divine providence. In these times we are called-upon to have faith in divine providence as never before - including that, as Christian, we recognize our own free agency, and the need for us individually to exercise it - because that is how God does good, and indeed the main (or perhaps only) way that God can do good in such a world as now - when socio-political group-good is dead and gone. 

And this is easy for God to do - it is what God does; but is almost impossible for us to see - and actually impossible for us to predict: hence the absolute need for faith, sustained by solid hope in the resurrected life to come. 

Note: This may seem nebulous at first, because so utterly unfamiliar - yet anyone who really understands Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings has been given the best imaginable lesson in the workings of providence for Good. 

Members of Christian churches may have noticed that, just as 'obedience' nowadays means compliance with the agenda of evil; 'unity' now means joining with the alliance of evil: joining the evil side in the spiritual war. 

This effect of striving to gain or maintain unity has eaten like a cancer at all forms of institution and organization; and seems to present two harmful alternatives. Either unity is a priority and the institution assimilates with the global totalitarian Establishment Plan. Or else, unity is sacrificed to Good - and the institution fractures and disperses.  

What seems actually to be happening is that all formal organizations are by-this-time either already on the side of evil - or else are moving in that direction. In order for a formal organization to continue to exist, it must engage with the major bureaucratic systems - and thereby conform to the overall motivations and objectives of these systems - which are evil. 

Since early 2020; the whole public sphere, all over the world, has been captured by the demonic intelligences that are pursuing an agenda of damnation.   

We are moving into a very stark world where the whole public sphere - including, of course, all formally-organized churches - is more-and-more evil: polarizing away-from The Good - and the process is perceptibly accelerating. 

What once were Christian virtues - such as obedience to the church and desire for church unity - have become pathways to damnation.

The only 'groups' exempt from this inexorable corruption (made inexorable by its being invisible and/or denied), are those based upon love rather than system: marriage, the family and friendship relationships based around shared Christian goals. Only these are not 'institutions'; only these are outside The System, The Matrix.  

It should be unsurprising that to recognize these facts in oneself is not a cause of misery but a liberation and grounds for hope. Truth is joyful. 

We can disengage from futile battles to 'save' institutions that are already (and willingly) lost; and focus our efforts on the real war, with real allies.

And, whatever happens in mortal life on earth (and that outcome cannot be predicted, so long as some Men consciously live from their freedom, and some of these choose to be agents of God); sure and certain knowledge of the resurrected life everlasting to come, means that those who choose the side of Good (rather than 'unity') will win: ultimately and finally.  

Note added: Actually, there is a possibility by which an institution or organization might theoretically continue to exist on the side for God; and that is for its necessarily-corrupting interactions with The World to be conducted with full awareness of their sinfulness; and explicitly recognizing and repenting these sins. Such an institution would need to be conscious that its survival entailed sinning; and to decide that it wanted or needed to survive nonetheless; but conscious that this survival entailed deliberate continuation in sinning.

And this is precisely what the large majority of (self-styled) Christian churches should have done, but did not do. 

To some significant (and increasing) extent, this is the analogous situation in which every Christian finds himself in the world, now. If it has not already arrived; a time may soon come when the choice is to continue living - or to accept death. And in such a situation some will - rightly - choose to continue living (e.g. parents of young children).

This has been the situation for innumerable Christian slaves through history - sin in obedience to the slave master, or die. 

It is still possible to be a Christian and stay alive under such conditions; because the repentance of Jesus Christ is essentially to acknowledge that we have sinned and to acknowledge that Christ is our forgiveness. Repentance is not (fortunately for the world, because it is impossible) to cease from sinning. 

Jesus came to save sinners - like us - not perfected Men. But we must know our-selves as sinners, and know the answer to sin.    

It is generally appreciated that some combination of both effort and ability is necessary to achieve anything positive and constructive in this world. 

Other versions of the insight are that general intelligence (e.g. as measured relatively by IQ tests) and 'conscientiousness' (the ability to work hard and for sustained periods on a particular task) are the best predictors of success in education and the workplace - and that each has a multiplier effect on the other (without some of both, very little is possible). 

But what is neglected, or mistakenly taken for granted, is that effort and ability need to be properly directed - or else they would be neutral at best, and most likely destructive.

Up until recently it has simply been assumed that human society will be - overall - properly directed; so that a society's functionality will depend on a hard-working and able population. 

That is because human societies of the past were - mostly - directed at their own survival and growth. So the assumption was mostly justified and true. 

But now that we live in a society, a world, where the mainstream motivation is one of self-hatred the direction is destructive - the importance of direction has become of primary concern. 

Indeed, when effort and ability are turned against society - then the more able and industrious societies will be destroyed more rapidly.

When individual persons are no longer motivated by what used to be regarded as common sense - power, survival, security, reproduction etc. - then the more able and industrious will be those who most rapidly destroy their own power, survival, security, reproduction etc.  

This reversal of what was for centuries taken for granted is what has rendered obsolete (and harmful) whole areas of human discourse, in both the social and psychological sciences. 

All of which is why I have so often described the current crisis as one of motivation. 

Because we are materialists who deny the transcendent and the post-mortal and the spirit; we are weakly motivated hence wide-open to external manipulation. 

Because we are not Christian; our motivations (such as they are) are against that which is Good - which is true, beautiful and virtuous. 

So we, and our societies, are engaged in self-destruction by a kind of feeble and covert suicide. Feeble because we are demotivated; and covert so that we can pretend to our-selves that nothing has 'really' changed and we still pursue the good. 

This social suicide is proceeding progressively, and accelerating. All means (such as effort and ability, innovation and organization) are being turned to that end. 

Therefore, so long as we neglect the matter of our end, goal, teleology, purpose - our proper direction; all our striving will continue to be counter-productive; and the greater the striving, the faster the damage.

And suddenly, like a thunderbolt, the realisation fell into my mind, so that I felt the roots of my hair stir with it. Of course! That was the whole meaning of the nineteenth century, Wordsworth and Keats and Hoffmann and Wagner and Bruckner. 

All material is spiritual but the spiritual is larger than the material.

This means that all material impositions Just Are Spiritual. So that when birdemic-peck rules and restrictions are imposed upon church services and interactions; this is a spiritual imposition. 

For the ruling evil Establishment - the mainstream ideology is that there is no spiritual; but when they impose material changes upon society (and upon Christians) - they switch their argument to stating that the truly spiritual ought to be above the material - for example that a truly spiritual Christian would be utterly indifferent to the material changes imposed in the name of 'health'. 

The exact phenomenon can be observed about any other societal function. The idea that education, science, law, policing, even medicine itself - are not affected by imposed material changes from the bidemic, climate change, antiracism, or the sexual revolution; and that those truly dedicated to the primary activity would be unconcerned by them. ...

That (for instance) a 'real', dedicated, idealistic teacher or doctor would be indifferent to operating among birdemic restrictions - just as a spiritual priest would 'rise above' the trivial irrelevances of masks, distancing, sanitizing etc. 

A real appreciator of drama, film, music or the arts (They say) would be able to (and should - if they were serious) ignore and not 'obsess-over' politically correct distortions and woke-messaging - leftist propaganda - in the media and arts they engage with. 

All this is false - a deceptive and manipulative lie. 

All material has spiritual implications and is expressive of spiritual intentions. And all the above material changes are motivated by evil. 

Only one who is complicit with the agenda of evil could or should be indifferent to the purposive material manifestations of evil as they infiltrate those social activities he cares deeply about. 

The material is spiritual; material change is spiritual change - so when that material change of evil provenance imposes upon that which we value; indifference signifies not a 'higher' and more-spiritual attitude - but habitual servitude to The Agenda. 

The subject of love is clearly one of vital, indeed core, importance to Christians - but 'love' has also become a core assertion of non-Christians - including the mainstream, leftist materialist ideology that rules the world. 

Consequently, several qualitatively different - and opposed - ideas of love are prevalent; and are conflated in public discourse as and when this suits the agenda of evil. For instance, in a particular period of the 1960s 'love' became a code-word for 'promiscuous sex'. 

But many Christians are - I think - deeply and dangerously mistaken about the nature of love; in ways that interfere with their faith and render them vulnerable to subversion.

There is a concept of love that I would regard as 'mainstream' - and which is sustained by elements from the Leftist politics of the global Establishment, Platonic philosophy, and the Western versions of Eastern religions (Buddhist, Hindu, Sufi etc). 

Mainstream love has the following characteristics. It seeks union*, a state of oneness - without separation of the participants. Those who love are equal; and the ideal of mainstream love is universality: all will love everyone else equally - in the same way and to the same degree. 

...Indeed - ideally - a perfect mainstream love should encompass every living and non-living thing in the same way and to the same degree: the earth, the universe and everything in it. 

 

Against the concept of mainstream love I would place what I understand as Christian love - which is almost the opposite. 

Christian love is between two specific people; who are separate, qualitatively-different and unique persons. Love is therefore rooted in permanent difference, and is in a deep sense complementary. 

Christian love is that which links the two, which keeps them together - love is that which makes difference harmonious. 

And when such Christian love enlarges beyond the two, it does so like a network of dyadic (one-to-one) linkages; so that the love of many is Not an immersion into universality, oneness and equality-sameness; but instead a web of unique elements.

Christian love can be imagined as the harmony of different beings that results from a sharing of purpose and motivation. 

Like all affairs on this earth; Christian love is vulnerable to the vicissitudes and dominating entropy of mortal life. 

But those who discern the nature of Christian love, and desire to live by it in eternity; are able to do so by Jesus Christ's gift of resurrection into Heaven.   

*Note added: In our totalitarian world - where all nations and social institutions are following the same core plan, under top-level demonic domination; it is increasingly clear that calls for 'unity' for any rationale - including both explicit arguments and covertly-implied narratives that put unity as a high and ultimate value - are (whether intentionally or deludedly) functional propaganda for submission to the global agenda of evil. 

Note: The 'medieval soul' is what I will call Rudolf Steiner's category of the 'intellectual soul' and it describes the way that people thought and behaved in Classical Greek, Roman and Medieval times - up to the changes of the 'modern' period (beginning around 1500 and becoming dominant from around 1800). 

The medieval soul tends to assert the unique and exclusive validity of a particular set of symbols and rituals to mediate between Man and the divine; and to assert that these are objectively effective, regardless of the intentions of the Men involved. 

And when Men are in the medieval soul phase of human development, these symbols and rituals will effectually induce contact with the divine in a powerful and reliable fashion.  

As of 20201, however, we are now well-advanced into the modern phase of consciousness, and the medieval soul has almost gone. 

The traditional symbols and rituals which used to be so powerful and reliable that Men built their lives upon and around them; have now become weak and un-reliable - and for many people have ceased to work at all (nor do people even want them to work). 

But the medieval soul does retain some residual activity and effectiveness in some people for some of the time. 

For example, after I first became a Christian there was a few years during which symbol and ritual in the church was powerful - despite my dawning awareness that it was seldom or never taken with full seriousness by the administering priests or other members of the congregation. 

Such waning of effectiveness of symbol and ritual in my-self mirrored in miniature the large trends in culture: and the sustaining of such practices with sufficient strength through time seems now to happen extremely seldom, and for ever fewer people.  

From early 2021 (and the successful international coup, excused by the birdemic) the World subjected Christendom to a severe test as to whether churches that professed the medieval soul really did believe-in (i.e. live-by) their professed belief in symbols and rituals as necessary and unique mediators. 

And the global churches (leaders and laity) overall comprehensively failed this test. 

The modern soul seems in practice to operate on the belief that that the symbols and rituals are Here-and-Now (whatever they may have been in other times and places) means to an end. 

And, regarded as means, symbol and ritual are not just less effective than before - but insufficiently effective. They are now not effective enough for our needs.  

That is my point here: On the one hand it is easy to argue convincingly that the traditional systems of symbol and ritual are 1. better than nothing, and 2. much better than the value-inversions of mainstream and official culture. 

But, and this is the crux: better than nothing and better than evil does Not mean that traditional symbols and rituals are good enough. They aren't. 

Therefore, over recent decades, and especially the past year-and-a-half; I think that we have been shown - as clearly as such things ever can be show - that traditional symbol and ritual (of whatever tradition) is Not Good Enough. 

By which I mean, traditional Christianity is not-good-enough to withstand the (unprecedented) strength and ubiquity of the current global onslaught of evil. It has failed comprehensively. 

This does not imply that everybody should abandon the traditional churches - because so long as symbol and ritual provides You with extra courage, strength and Good motivation; then it is justified. 

But it does imply that we have reached a point at which honest consideration seems to lead inexorably to the conclusion that symbol and ritual are Now a means to an end, and should be regarded as such. 

Some will do without those particular means - and will use different means to the same end; others will need to adopt a different attitude to the means and ends. 

Yet symbol and ritual cannot now (or cannot convincingly) be regarded as having the same kind of objective and inexorable effectiveness as they did for the medieval soul - we now recognize that we cannot rely on them, as it was once possible to do.  

Thus effective Christianity must and will change, and from a basis in individual discernment - or else Christianity will continue rapidly to perish by assimilation into the global totalitarian evil - as all large and mainstream Christian churches have apparently chosen to do. 

Some should and will continue working with the traditions of symbol and ritual - but now infusing them with a new conscious and chosen subjectivism; and thereby re-vitalizing them (giving them new life). 

Others will follow other paths. 

We are lucky to be alive now; when such matters have become clear - instead of living during the recent generations where there has been incremental weakening of tradition, and Christians have been sleepwalking into the arms of Satan.

Thirteen is the age of what Shaw calls ‘the birth of the moral passion’ - that is, the period when ideas are not abstractions but realities, when they are food and drink. The changes of puberty have altered one’s old conception of oneself. Identity vanishes; one’s inner being becomes formless, chaos waiting for the act of creation. There is a brooding feeling of anticipation; the clouds lie there, fragmentary, slate grey, waiting for the wind. And a book, a symphony, a poem, is not merely another ‘experience’ but a mystery, a wind blowing from the future. The problem of death is still far away; but the problem of life seems quite as tremendous. The mind contemplates vistas of time, the emptiness of space, and knows that the ‘ordinariness’ of everyday life is an illusion. And as the everyday becomes less real, so ideas are seen to be the only reality, and the mind that shapes them the only true power in this world of blind natural forces.

From The Philosopher's Stone; a novel by Colin Wilson, 1969

The above passage could describe my own adolescent development of consciousness; a phase which lasted up to age twenty-one and then went off the rails by regressing into pseudo-adolescent immaturity for a couple of decades. 

The reason was much the same as reported by CS Lewis in his autobiography Surprised by Joy which was that I strove to maintain or expand the highest experiences of ecstatic consciousness - 'Joy' - but found these actually becoming less frequent and intense. 

I failed to become a Christian, and thereby failed to discover a reality of purpose, meaning and personal participation in 'the universe'.

 

Yet in retrospect I can perceive that all of the necessary ingredients were in-place for me to take the step into Romantic Christianity: that is Bernard Shaw, Colin Wilson and William Arkle. 

From Shaw (which I began reading aged thirteen) I took the idea of Creative Evolution; which was that the purpose of life was to attain higher states of consciousness; and that this was (for someone like me) a master passion. 

From Colin Wilson I learned that this could be the basis of a positive and optimistic world view; in contrast to the nihilism and despair of the prevalent Western culture. 

From William Arkle (had I read him with more care and seriousness) I could have got that these ideas only become deep, strong and courageous with the insight that behind all is a personal and loving God who created reality with the aim of raising Men to divine level - by a process based (as Shaw perceived) on our own efforts, trials and errors.

Also from Arkle that this development (or 'evolution', in the older meaning) took place in the setting of a universe of Beings - where all of creation was alive, conscious and in relationship.  

Yes, all the required ingredients were indeed there - but I tool a very long, slow and tortuous route to notice, learn and assemble them. 

From 1956 onwards; Colin Wilson identified the prevailing pessimism of the Western intellectual class - writers, visual artists, philosophers etc - and concluded it was rooted in negative basic assumptions concerning the nature of reality. 

Wilson went on to argue - I think convincingly - that if more positive and optimistic assumptions were instead adopted, then human life would be more enjoyable and worthwhile. Some other more or less influential writers said much the same - such as Abraham Maslow. 

This is a pragmatic argument - in the sense that it is not based upon the truth about the world (neither Wilson nor Maslow believed in the reality of God) but based on the assertion that life will be better if you believe so. The same type of argument was used by William James around 1900, Robert M Pirsig in 1974, or Richard Rorty.

But this did not happen. Pessimism prevailed. Mainstream basic metaphysical assumptions asserted (inter alia) that the universe, life and consciousness all happened by accident - and were not headed in any particular direction; the spiritual realm is a fiction, there is no soul, and death is annihilation.  

In the context of the already-existing Western culture; pragmatic arguments made no significant difference because believing and acting upon them they carried a penalty. First condescension and disdain - i.e. low status). Then material disadvantage; because professional success was optimized by conforming to the prevailing ideology, artistic and philosophical success to extending the successful trends. 

In a twentieth century context, when confronted with tough decisions - when long term possible benefit was blocked by immediate term disadvantage - pragmatic, un-rooted optimism was just too weak.

In other terms we can observe that the demonic powers were getting a grip on Western culture from even as early as the 19th century; and increasingly 'rigged' things such that pragmatic optimism was discouraged, yet unthinking, habitual pessimism prevailed. 

Pessimism was simply assumed and adopted spontaneously, while the onus of proof was on optimism. When the justification for optimism was merely pragmatic, then this was regarded as equivalent to admitting it was "made-up because I am too weak to face the bleakness of reality". 

Colin Wilson was cheerful by nature and largely immune to cultural trends, however this applies to few people. Most people will only be optimistic when they believe it is based on truth - on reality. 

Which means that when culture is more and more against us, we can only be optimistic when we believe in the reality of a loving personal God, and that joy and fulfillment are possible (and can be ours) outside of this mortal life and finite planet.