DIGGING FOR HEAVENLY: THE REALITY OF MYSTERY IN THREE UNIVERSES.

The third constant that permeates all three universes is that of mystery. Mystery, as I define it, is the unknown yet knowable part of reality in the physical universe, the mental universe, and the spiritual universe. It is the unknown part of reality just beyond reason and our ability to see what reality looks like that is invisible or in the future, but also how our smattering of hints and experiences makes sense out of what is, by all accounts, just beyond our pay grade.

All of this goes back to my assumption that what is true in one universe must also be true in all three, although the substance in each might look and be totally different because of its nature. Once again, I use Teilhard’s map of reality as a framework in which I can look at these three universes as a framework to house mystery in each. At the core of all reality is the context in which matter exists. There is movement within the scope of time that is both complex and conscious. To exist as matter, as mind, or at that highest level of human evolution, being adopted sons and daughters of the Father and heirs to that next step just beyond our ability “to see” with our physical eyes, is difficult to comprehend for the human mind if the only assumption is that reality only exists if you can “see” it. Mystery uses what we can observe and deduce from what we can see to probe into a dimension of reality that we think is there but don’t “see” as visible reality. To view my conclusions (so far) about mystery as a constant spanning the three universes of reality, I would like to share my conjectures and reasoning.

Mystery in the physical universe — Mystery presupposes that there is a human consciousness to be aware that it exists at all. How can matter be a mystery? To whom? Humans? Matter existed before there was even an earth on which humans could reason and choose good from evil. Mystery in the physical universe, which, according to the Teilhard map in Figure 1, is all matter from creation up to the entry of Homo Sapiens into a new paradigm, reason, but also the ability to choose beyond the behavioral dictates of inorganic and organic lifeforms, is beholden to the laws of nature. As humans use their mental universe to develop a view of what is out there, we use human mental capacities to do that. Reason and the ability of individuals to choose what is meaningful for them (good or evil) without retribution is a hallmark of being human. The mental universe looks at the physical universe and can ask interrogatory questions about what is out there and what makes up matter. Nature conforms to the laws and rules that govern its activity. The mystery to me is who told, regardless of the laws in play, and which guides all reality without being self-aware? There is so much we don’t know about the dynamics of space, time, matter, and evolution that we are just at the beginning of understanding what makes up reality, and even less about how it all fits together.

This mystery of the physical world is what I term the Genesis Principle, principle here being “that which flows from anything in any way.” It is shrouded in mystery, at least to my human capability and capacity to fully explain it, but nonetheless exists. I know it is there, but I can’t quite focus on it with the languages and tools I have accumulated over the years. Like black matter, or black energy, I see the effects of the Genesis Principle in the motion of all matter, mind, and spirituality, invisibly pulled not just to a future point of final attainment but also inexorably trending towards more sophistication and accumulation natural to its existence.

Mystery in the mental universe — If the physical universe is the base upon which the mental universe depends for existence, then this difference is a new paradigm from what went before, one that now includes self-awareness and the ability of each individual to determine not only what matter looks like, but also what it means. There is a problem for humans. There is a realm of visible reality that also includes the invisible yet real emotions, values, and characteristics that make us ache for a higher level of our humanity.

That next level of intelligent progression is the Christ Principle, the natural movement of all three universes in complexity and consciousness as collective reality to become what they can become through the Genesis Principle. The Genesis Principle is in effect from then until it isn’t. The Christ Principle, evolving from the Genesis Principle, continues movement from the Incarnation of Christ until matter and mind are no longer.

That leaves the third Principle, The Principle of Absolute Truth, which begins at Pentecost with the Holy Spirit, which Teilhard maps in Figure 1, “Penumatosphere,” or the evolution of humanity to now receive the possibility of tapping into absolute truth, absolutely.

Mystery in the spiritual universe — No one gets to the spiritual universe without help. Just as our physical universe is the basis for the mental universe, so too, the mental universe is the rocket booster for me to achieve that next level of my evolution, one not dependent on the mystery of matter or mind. I use these two realms of reality to access the mystery of the spiritual universe, in that the deepest level of my humanity is a free choice based on reason. The problem comes when I must step out in front of what my comfort zone of humanity tells me is real and abandon everything I thought I knew about what humanity means to step out in front of reality (existential Catholicism) to choose what might be out there, but is not verifiable with all the tools that I have accumulated to find meaning in physical and mental reality.

I have discovered a pattern of movement in reality of three universes consistent with what I think is the next step. The movement of matter contains the complexity and consciousness from which it evolved or was created. The problem for me is how do I use what limited tools I have as a human at my stage of evolution to peer just ever so slightly into the profound mysteries of the physical world, the mental world, and all the above to make limited sense through what I perceive the spiritual world to be. I not only don’t possess that knowledge through my own life experiences, but all humans also have the same problem.

Humanity lacks the power or energy to move to that deepest level of our evolution, one that frees us from matter, one that uses our human reasoning and free will as it was intended by the Genesis Principle before the Fall in the Garden of Eden. The archtype of what awaits us if we make the choice to abandon reason and choose to accept the power of pure energy (Holy Spirit) to overshadow us and lift us up not to be God but to be what human nature intended, is a being who lives in a state beyond death but with those treasures he or she collected along the way to furnish a continuation of the movement of complexity and consciousness but forever.

The Mystery of Faith is the key to unlock the mysteries of physical, mental, and spiritualities, as I can receive them in my mind and heart.

The way that I achieve immortality as epitomized through the Resurrection of Christ as the archetype of what this new, next level looks like for humans, is to seek truth for me as the individual so that I can make a choice which all of reality has prepared me to make from the beginning, to use the Mystery of Faith to take a leap from reason of the world to its complete opposite, the spiritual universe that endures beyond matter and time, but in which my humanity florishes 100% of my nature. The life I experience as a result of Baptism is not without difficulties, because, like the notion of Erich Fromm in his Art of Loving, humans don’t receive faith, love, or truth automatically as infused knowledge. Each individual must dig to reach the treasure just below the surface, not of the ground of their being, but within the upper room of our inner selves. It takes work, and because of the effects of that freedom of choice, to know what is good or evil, what works to help me reach my potential as a human, or what derails me until I fix the track and get my train on the path that leads to a life meant to be from the beginning.

Christ as mystic Hero, as explained by Joseph Campbell, walks the archetypal way of humanity, overcoming obstacles such as the limitations of matter, the rationalizations of the human mind, and its tendency to be the arbiter of what is good or evil, leading up to the greatest anomaly of all, overcoming the limitations of death to fulfill what Adam and Eve threw away about being human to become adopted sons or daughters of the Father. https://www.jcf.org/

The Mystery of Faith is the totality of all that is in reality (visible and invisible) being manifest to individuals through the interaction between a Divine Being and a Human Being. Because none of us live on the level of the Trinity, the Son of God freely chose to become human to share what might seem as a preposterous invitation to an unseen dimension, one having no foundation in ordinary human perceptions. (Phillipians 2:5-12) Each human has the invitation to choose this higher level of humanity, but not everyone knows about it or has the opportunity to select it, if they did know. One of the missions of the Catholic Church Universal, as given to it by Christ, is to go into the whole world, preaching the Good News. The encyclical Gaudium et Spes (https://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19651207_gaudium-et-spes_en.html) gives a well-rounded approach to the requirement that an individual must be born of water and the Spirit to enter the kingdom of heaven. Worrying about who goes to heaven is way above my pay grade. What is my responsibility is to let people know that Christ loved us all and allowed each one of us to become adopted sons and daughters of the Father, but only if we choose to do so.