Lucid Dreaming and the Pope

Good Business Sense

The Pope … a Rabbi … and a high class call girl … were walking in the park. ' I'm feeling funny about being seen with you guys ' she protested. ' I don't actually see you … I'm rather prone to hear you in my presence,' replied the Rabbi. The Pope was thoughtful for a bit … and then remarked … ' Well if everybody did that  then nobody would actually see us with you,' said the Pope, … ' isn't that your concern?' ' Thank goodness ,' replied the call girl, ' I thought its going to wreck my business.'

 

They paused at a rose bush … and the Pope remarked how beautiful the roses were. ' I don't see them that way,' said the Rabbi, ' only their complaints … that the ground grows thorns for the sinful.' ' I thought HE said that? ' The Pope retorted. ' Right ' replied the Rabbi … ' that's where I must have heard it.'

 

We certainly can … if we wanted … to hear his voice ' speak ' to us. Its the premise of that which scientist are referring to as ' Lucid Dreaming ' (LD)… in the experience of man. But the obvious manner in which the issue is approached … managed … guided … and subject to a clear sense of decorum … would be very important indeed. We can certainly hear HIM speak to us … if we have cultivated a view of him  … that is entirely  consistent with his personality … and his presence in the universe.

 

How is LD different from anything we have experienced before? Before LD … we experienced what we did as passions … passively engaged.  In LD … we are applying our volition to the view of anything … and it engages us in what that meaning is on a personal basis … not what someone else left as a echo in our passions. It would certainly demand that we bring an informed perception of matters to our views.

 

In the strange case of the call girl walking with the Rabbi and the Pope … the call girl has certainly been dispatched into a dream that nobody is seeing her with the two illustrious gentlemen. It begs the question … ' Is that real? ' And the answer to that can only be … its true to her if she believes it … and isn't that the only way man believes anything? And such are the questions that linger in our minds … in these times of the ' faith dilemma.'

 

In the Indic tradition … when the Vaishnavite practice commenced in 500 bc … it proposed the position of man … as something resembling the experience of  LD. It was the self same dream that united India under the banner of Chandragupta Maurya in the following years. However as the society grew … and the social nature of man became complex with a greater engagement of views and styles … it was no longer possible … to be defined simply … by the way one man views his personal beliefs as being true. Consequently it evolved into the Saivite tradition.

 

At this time … the church appears to be undergoing a similar transformation from the personal to a greater social and collective view of man. In that … its making clear the issues of the transition from … that of the personal and same sex preponderance … to viewing man in the social role in society. Hence the Pope's initiative in setting the Synod … for the establishment of family values … is entirely in keeping with the needs of the community. As the media calls it … it'll be the defining feature of the present Papacy in office.

 

In the Indic experience … the event of the transition … was the cause of the great Mahabarata war. It broke every notion and view of man … that existed naturally in the human constitution … and challenged society to review its innate experiences … in order to bring a greater voice to their volition on matters. Something similar may well be in store for the Western experience … but fortunately they are at this time faced with more options in managing it … than the Indics did in 500 bc.

 

The Vatican can take the initiative … for the research on LD. It would help to make clearer the issues of faith … in relation to the physiology of the human body … and the growing rationality of the human temperament. Certainly they themselves … in the service of God … would want to be clear of the precise nature of the task and labor of representing the grand divine … in the community of man.

 

Indic community came to realize in the course of civilization and scholarship that … it was foolish to think Saivite philosophy was going to defeat the Vaishnavite. Today … the mind of learning is waking to the view that both are the pillars to human society … in a continued progression of the evolutionary experience. It presents a challenge to man … on issues of chauvinism … equality of the sexes … and the experience of duality in the life of the world. No doubt … it must pursue a paced progression of its experiences … to allow man to create the acceptance.

 

The issue is the hallmark of life in the 21^st Century … and its tentacles are extended wide all over the world. It is encountered on a daily basis … and the issues of terrorism … growing incidences of dementia … fractionalization of the family … civil unrest … wars … and the precarious nature of childhood in these times … beg for a collective will on the matter by all concerned. It would mark the defining feature of the century.

 

Its a strange malady to find in these times … that even while the cry for greater cohesion on issues grows in the world … we are also treated to the possibility of dreaming our beliefs on a personal basis … and only seeing what we want. Its unprecedented in its scope of influence in the world … but we do have the experience of communities in the past to rely on for guide. Unless we create the necessary response … my dreaming says … ' Its going to wreck our business.'