The Rebirth of Reincarnation

While participating in Easter Vigil, with the Blessing of Fire and all, I realized that there are a few further comments that need to be said regarding this paragraph of the catechism:

1013 Death is the end of man's earthly pilgrimage, of the time of grace and mercy which God offers him so as to work out his earthly life in keeping with the divine plan, and to decide his ultimate destiny. When "the single course of our earthly life" is completed, we shall not return to other earthly lives: "It is appointed for men to die once." There is no "reincarnation" after death.

An underlying assumption in this denial of reincarnation is that the human person is composed of body, mind, and the soul, or the very self (that which makes awareness of body and mind possible). What this denial of reincarnation means is that the very self does not associate itself with another physical body-mind, after the death of the physical body-mind. From a scientific perspective, this denial is not accurate. The very self does indeed associate itself with another physical body-mind -- during any one particular lifetime. That is, the atoms and molecules, the thoughts and feelings, of a person are constantly changing in any one lifetime. The atoms that existed in your body as an infant will most likely be replaced completely by the time you turn 10. The thoughts in your mind are changing at an even faster rate. So one person might have multiple physical body-minds over one lifetime. That in itself is a sort of "reincarnation".

But the above quote from the catechism is about dying only once, and not gaining another physical body-mind. And yet, even that claim is not totally true. In Christian theology, the dead will undergo a physical resurrection of the body-mind. The resurrected body might be quite different from the body one once had, but it will be physical or solid in some sense. So living as a resurrected person in a resurrected body-mind is a type of "reincarnation", though not a reincarnation into another "earthly" life.

Still, reincarnation into another earthly life might still be compatible with Christian thought. If one considers the atoms that exist in a body, then it is conceivable that atoms hold 'memories' of bodies that once included them. These 'memories' might entail some sort of energetic pattern that remains stable over time. Perhaps these atomic 'memories' are able to induce mental 'memories' in persons' bodies. The atoms of a serial killer, for instance, might carry the energetic patterns associated with that killer's actions and thoughts. The killer himself might be executed, but his atoms might carry the killer's energetic patterns into new bodies; and the persons who embody these atoms might have to deal with those energetic patterns, perhaps tolerate them, resist them, transform them. In such a scenario, the killer's energetic patterns did in fact "re-incarnate", even if the very self of the killer did not. Such an interpretation of "reincarnation" is also compatible with the highest philosophies in Hinduism and Buddhism. What all this means is that we are all indeed "our brother's keeper": what we do affects not only ourselves, but our descendants as well. And what our ancestors (both human and non-human) did, affects us, in more ways than we may have thought.

Live as if you'll live a 100 years. Love as if you'll die tomorrow.
Live as if you'll reincarnate for a 100 eons. Love as if you have just one life.

The Ultimate Birth and Death

Historically, Christianity has most often taken a certain position on death:

1013 Death is the end of man's earthly pilgrimage, of the time of grace and mercy which God offers him so as to work out his earthly life in keeping with the divine plan, and to decide his ultimate destiny. When "the single course of our earthly life" is completed, we shall not return to other earthly lives: "It is appointed for men to die once." There is no "reincarnation" after death.

There are many points that could be made regarding the issue of reincarnation and Christianity. I would suggest that reincarnation, properly understood, is not antithetical to Christianity (just as it is not antithetical to Judaism, or Islam). For instance, it is true, as many Christians believe, that "there is no reincarnation after death". At the same time, it is also true, as quite a few Christians believe, that there is reincarnation after death. Now, the reader may be puzzled, and begin to ask, "How can A and B both be true, when A and B make opposite claims?" The reader may then ask, "How can both reincarnation and non-reincarnation be true?"

A certain Sufi teacher, Bawa Muhaiyaddeen, suggested one way in which both can be true. (In fact, many Sufis make the same or a similar type of suggestion.) The human person is one, of course, but death signals a separation of the components of the human person. The human person is composed of body, mind, and the Very Self. The elements of the body form, exist, and transform into some other form. The atom in your thumb, for instance, once existed in another form, perhaps another person, and in the future, that atom will exist in another form. In short, that atom will "reincarnate". The elements of the mind (thoughts, feelings, intentions, e.g.) likewise exist in your consciousness. These elements of the mind also existed in some other form previously, and will exist in another form at some time in the future. Thus, the mental elements also "reincarnate".

Some person, after your own physical death, will inherit your physical atoms, as well as your mental elements. Thus, that person would be, in some sense, a reincarnation of previous persons, including yourself.

However, the human person is not just body, and not just mind. The human person also is the Very Self, that which makes awareness of the body and the mind possible. This Very Self (known to the Hindus as the Atman) does not change, even while associated with the constantly changing body and mind. While the body and mind undergo their alterations, the Very Self does not "appear" and it does not "disappear". While the body and mind are born and die, the Very Self never takes birth, and the Very Self will never die. The Very Self does not incarnate, and thus does not re-incarnate.

Nonetheless, according to the Sufis, the Very Self did take birth once, and it will indeed "die" once. The Very Self was born at the moment Very God created it, and the Very Self will "die" when it finally returns to Very God.

To say that man is born once and dies once, is to refer to the Very Self arising from God and returning to God. Such a process happens once and only once. To say that man reincarnates, is to refer to the elements of the body and of the mind. Since man is body, mind, and Very Self, man both reincarnates and does not reincarnate.

The Promised Infallibility

The issue of infallibility is thus defined:

890 The mission of the Magisterium is linked to the definitive nature of the covenant established by God with his people in Christ. It is this Magisterium's task to preserve God's people from deviations and defections and to guarantee them the objective possibility of professing the true faith without error. Thus, the pastoral duty of the Magisterium is aimed at seeing to it that the People of God abides in the truth that liberates. To fulfill this service, Christ endowed the Church's shepherds with the charism of infallibility in matters of faith and morals. The exercise of this charism takes several forms:

891 "The Roman Pontiff, head of the college of bishops, enjoys this infallibility in virtue of his office, when, as supreme pastor and teacher of all the faithful - who confirms his brethren in the faith he proclaims by a definitive act a doctrine pertaining to faith or morals. . . . The infallibility promised to the Church is also present in the body of bishops when, together with Peter's successor, they exercise the supreme Magisterium," above all in an Ecumenical Council. When the Church through its supreme Magisterium proposes a doctrine "for belief as being divinely revealed," and as the teaching of Christ, the definitions "must be adhered to with the obedience of faith." This infallibility extends as far as the deposit of divine Revelation itself.

The doctrine of infallibility operates on two levels: definition and inclusiveness. The definition of infallibility is a negative definition: being preserved from "deviations and defections", teaching doctrine "without error". For instance, to say "the sun is a star" is to say an infallible statement, a statement that is error-free. The statement "the sun is big" can also be seen as infallible, without error, since the sun is indeed big under many standards of measurement. Even though the sun may not look big when seen from earth, or when compared to even larger celestial objects, to say "the sun is big" is not to say something in error. Thus, an infallible statement is true, but an infallible statement is not necessarily the last word on the subject.

And that leads to the second level of infallibility: inclusiveness. An infallible statement, though without error, is not exclusive, or exhaustive. An infallible statement may be without error, but being without error is different from being an exhaustive statement that says everything that can be said about the subject. To say "humans are animals" may be without error, but it doesn't say everything that there is to say about humans, or animals, for that matter. An infallible statement need not be the last word on an issue.

So, the Church's doctrine of the infallibility of, say, the Roman Pontiff, is restricted to issues concerning "matters of faith and morals". Whatever the Pontiff says about faith and morals need not be infallible, though. Only certain statements concerning faith and morals, under defined conditions, are considered infallible. And even these infallible statements, though without error, are not the final words on the subject.

The Immaculate Conception

The CCC explains the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception:

491 Through the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary, "full of grace" through God, was redeemed from the moment of her conception. That is what the dogma of the Immaculate Conception confesses, as Pope Pius IX proclaimed in 1854:

The most Blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin.

There are many ways to understand the Immaculate Conception. One way is to understand Mary as an Avatar, Daughter of Durga, who took birth as the Mother of Jesus, in order to perform the work She needed to accomplish in conjunction with Jesus. By stating that Mary was kept free from the original forgetfulness (or original sin), the Church is stating that Mary was an Avatar. By stating that her initial and subsequent freedom from original forgetfulness was a result of the "merits of Jesus Christ", the Church is stating that Mary took birth as human form before Jesus did, but only because of the work both Mary and Jesus were to accomplish.

Hail Mary, Full of Grace
The Lord is with You.
Blessed are You among women,
And blessed is the fruit of Your womb, Jesus.
Holy Mary, Mother of God,
Pray for us sinners,
Now and at the hour of our death.
Amen.

The Christ Guru

In Christian theology, Jesus is called "the Christ", and "the Son of God":

441 In the Old Testament, "son of God" is a title given to the angels, the Chosen People, the children of Israel, and their kings. It signifies an adoptive sonship that establishes a relationship of particular intimacy between God and his creature. When the promised Messiah-King is called "son of God", it does not necessarily imply that he was more than human, according to the literal meaning of these texts. Those who called Jesus "son of God", as the Messiah of Israel, perhaps meant nothing more than this.

442 Such is not the case for Simon Peter when he confesses Jesus as "the Christ, the Son of the living God", for Jesus responds solemnly: "Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven." Similarly Paul will write, regarding his conversion on the road to Damascus, "When he who had set me apart before I was born, and had called me through his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles..." "and in the synagogues immediately [Paul] proclaimed Jesus, saying, 'He is the Son of God.'" From the beginning this acknowledgment of Christ's divine sonship will be the centre of the apostolic faith, first professed by Peter as the Church's foundation.

In Dharmic terms, Jesus the Christ is also known as the Avatar, the Buddha, the Bhagavan. The Avatar is the descent of the Divine into human form. The Buddha is the awakener, the realizer. Bhagavan is the Blessed One. The Hebraic "son of God" refers to someone with a close relationship to God, and Jesus would certainly fit the bill and more. The Christian "Son of God" refers to someone who has realized his fullness-in-God, to the point of being one with God consciously and embodiedly.

In Dharmic terms, the Son of God would be a Sat-Guru, someone capable of bringing others into the state of fullness-in-God, to the point of being able to confess "I and the Father are One". Many followers of Jesus the Christ believe that Jesus is the Only Son of God; many followers believe otherwise. In any event, the important point is that whichever Sat-Guru would follows, one should be aware of the nature of such a relationship. The Divine Physics of that relationship flourishes in the context of the recognition of the very Divine Incarnation of the Sat-Guru. Sts. Peter and Paul recognized that Divine Incarnation in Jesus. Arjuna recognized it in Krishna, the Avatar. Sariputra recognized it in Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha. Khadijah recognized it in Muhammad, the Rasul.

Thus, Christianity is based on Guru-Bhakti Yoga, or the Spiritual Practice of Devotion to the Divine-Human Person. Swami Sivananda outlined some of the laws inherent in Guru-Bhakti Yoga:

1. To learn cooking, you need a teacher; to learn science you need a professor; to learn any art you need a master. Is not Guru necessary to learn Atma-Vidya?

2. Guru indeed is the sole refuge to take you across the Samsaric deluge.

3. On the thorny path of Truth to guide you there is none but Guru.

4. Guru’s Grace can work wonders.

5. In all your struggle of daily life, Guru will guide and protect you.

6. Guru is the torch-bearer of wisdom.

7. Guru, Isvara, Brahman, preceptor, teacher, Divine Master, etc., are synonymous terms.

8. Salute your Guru first before you salute God, because he takes you to God.

9. Take Mantra Diksha from your Guru. This will inspire and elevate you.

10. Guru will not do Sadhana for you. You will have to do it yourself.

11. Guru will show you the right path.

12. Guru can select the right Yoga for the disciple.

13. By Guru’s grace, the disciple can overcome obstacles and doubts on the path.

14. Guru will lift the disciple from the pitfalls and snares.

15. Sacrifice your body and life to serve your Guru. Then he will take care of your soul.

16. Don’t expect a miracle from your Guru to lift you up into Samadhi. Do rigorous Sadhana yourself. A hungry man will have to eat himself.

17. If you cannot get a Satguru you cannot progress in the spiritual path.

18. Be patient and wise in selecting your Guru, because you cannot divorce your Guru afterwards. It is the greatest sin.

19. Relation between Guru and Chela is sacred and lifelong. Understand this point very well.

Original Sin

The Christian theology of original sin:

397 Man, tempted by the devil, let his trust in his Creator die in his heart and, abusing his freedom, disobeyed God's command. This is what man's first sin consisted of. All subsequent sin would be disobedience toward God and lack of trust in his goodness.

398 In that sin man preferred himself to God and by that very act scorned him. He chose himself over and against God, against the requirements of his creaturely status and therefore against his own good. Constituted in a state of holiness, man was destined to be fully "divinized" by God in glory. Seduced by the devil, he wanted to "be like God", but "without God, before God, and not in accordance with God".

Original sin may also be understood in Buddhist terms. "Sin" itself would be an act of violence, untruth, dispossession, inebriation, or sensual infidelity; all five of these sins correspond to the five precepts of the Buddhist. The "devil" would correspond to the demon "Mara", who is often believed to be a personification of one's own temptations. The "Creator" refers to the very nature of reality, and how that very nature of reality was something our ancestors had complete trust in. Somehow, along the way, we've lost that basic trust in reality, in life. After losing trust, or "faith", in life, we disobeyed, or "forgot", what life had to tell us. To forget what life itself has to tell us, is to turn our attention away from life and toward our own limited ego-selves, thus preferring our ego-selves over and against life itself. It was our destiny to live in trust of life, and thus enter into greater and greater depths of life and living. But we forgot the big picture, and began to focus on the immediate gratification of the small picture, the small ego-self, thinking that the ego-self was somehow divine in and of itself. Whereas, the truth is that the ego-self can only realize its own divinity, by forgetting its own small self, and remembering life itself. The infinite growth into life, a journey that has no one end, is called "theosis" in Christianity, and "nirvana" in Buddhism.