The Real Deal

Let me share some observations about our present situation. It’s clear that this moment in history is a tipping point on almost every possible level. Whether your interest is the environment, global affairs, science and medicine, politics, cultural and social mores, religion or the weather, you will have to admit that something unusual is occurring. From the historical perspective, looking back reveals few eras when the Human species has arrived at a moment with such potential for dramatic transformation. From my vantage point we may be at a transitional period as meaningful as the move from Paleolithic to Neolithic, metaphorically speaking. The imminent evolutionary leap forward for our species may be matched or bettered by what the very planet we inhabit is facing.

Earth is a living being, as is every other celestial body in every galaxy in creation. And every manifest phenomenon on every level of being, however great or infinitesimal, exists within the framework of the innumerable orders of laws that bind everything together.

The two primary laws that permeate every aspect of the life of our planet and our species are at the very heart of existence in every corner of the universe: Fate and Accident.

There’s intention behind our existence. The exertion of a primal will initiated the phenomenon that religion calls Genesis and science calls “the big bang”. And that intentionality continues from the Alpha down through to the emergence of each new form. The overarching pattern of universal intention may be called creation or fate. But the volition that causes all things to move forward is matched by a force of almost equal power, the phenomenon known as randomness, chaos or accident.

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Truth is truth. It’s really very simple. The problems arise in the articulation of truth. Religious orthodoxies, scientific verities, historical narratives are all quagmires eventually, because they require agreement between those who present them to the world. And even consensus in the initial revelation of truth is no help when dissensions arise.

We’re a contentious species. We have such difficulty agreeing that it’s remarkable that we ever reach accord about anything. And the greater the import of the subject, the more ferocious the opposing arguments will assuredly be. A disagreement about the underpinnings of any significant religious or secular institution may lead to bloodshed and suffering for countless individuals over the course of generations as believers clash and kill in defense of their beliefs. Still, we search for answers.

My task is to convey to you my particular take on the truth and to do what I must to make this truth clear, understandable and consistent with the objective of doing the most possible good for the greatest number of people. I will be presenting ideas that may, at one and the same time, sound both alien and familiar and I will be presenting them, not as theory or hypothesis, but as flat fact. Use of allegory or parable will be minimal and I will use the contemporaneous voice of the culture that I inhabit with minimal rhetorical flourish. This is literal truth imparted in literal terms to a Twenty-first Century audience that should be prepared to accommodate complex ideas.

I am seeking resonance. I’m aiming for the consciousness of those of you who are yearning for the fulfillment of a barely articulated wish for real answers. You need a willingness to forgo traditional religious, philosophical or psychological constructs in favor of a more inclusive apprehension of being. I am bringing this to you directly and with hope, even though I am aware of the pitfalls that I’ve described.

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As a boy eight or nine years old I was inexplicably drawn to things religious. The small, working class town where I lived my entire young life was predominantly Roman Catholic, populated by large numbers of second and third generation Italians and Poles. I was fascinated by the rituals of communion, catechism class and Thursday afternoon confession that my friends and their families exposed me to and I became a secret practitioner of those small traditions like fish on Friday, ashes on Ash Wednesday and signing the cross near a church; traditions that hinted at the mysteries that I suspected were hidden from my sight behind the Gothic facades of my friends’ two local Catholic churches.

I was born an Episcopalian into an utterly non practicing WASP family. Although I was unimpressed with my religion’s version of ritual and mysticism, it was my church of birth and so, quite alone and without adult accompaniment, I began to attend Sunday service regularly. I had myself confirmed, made first communion and committed myself to altar boy duties for the 8 AM Sunday Mass every week. At home, in my bedroom, I crafted a small altar inside an old mahogany pipe cabinet appropriated from my father. With a mournful bronze Christ’s head in the center and small candles in the racks meant for pipes, it was a self contained sanctuary that I could open in solitude in order to commune with the personal Jesus who I looked to for comfort and meaning in a family and community that seemed to provide no comfortable place for me to be who I felt myself to be.

I was quite alone in my desire to learn from the church. Neither family nor friends appeared to share my fixation. I was responding to a private yearning that I had no way to express or fully understand. I felt a bittersweet longing to learn, to know why so many things made so little sense to me. My curiosity led me to religion, mainly because there were no answers to be found in my house or in school or from my friends or their families or anywhere else that I looked. Church won by default.

By adolescence the church no longer satisfied. I was uncovering a far greater number of questions than I was answers and the priests and other adults who I asked for help only confused with their efforts. I began to look elsewhere for the fulfillment of my need to know and understand why we are and how our world came to be. And the search that I started in a small church in a small town in middle-America has continued for decades and has taken me all over the planet. I’ve been a student and a teacher; a library and a laboratory. Today I begin to share what I’ve learned and to repay a debt to all those who have helped me make sense of my discoveries.

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