“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

Outside of that context, none of those fears make any sense at all (equally important, of course). In a large regard the church through the centuries ruled through the use of fear far more than the use of love. It was precisely in the area of artistic expression, of course, that the inspirations might quickest leap through the applied dogmatic framework. The political nature of inspirational material of any kind was well understood by the church.

Expression itself was considered highly suspect if it traveled outside of the accepted precepts, and particularly of course if it led others to take action against those precepts. To some extent the same type of policy is still reflected in your current societies, though science or the state itself may serve instead of the church as the voice of authority.

Many people’s economic well-being of course was dependent upon the church in one way or another, and in reincarnational terms many millions of people alive today were familiar then with such conditions. The nunneries and monasteries were long-time social and religious institutions, some extremely rigorous, while others were religiously oriented in name only. But there is a long history of the conflicts between creative thought, heresy, excommunication, or worse, death. All of those factors were involved in one way or another in the fabric of Ruburt’s nightmare material.

There are, however, classic connections between creative thought and heresy, between established belief and the danger of revelatory material as being disruptive—first of church and then of state.

([Gert:] “How then, does the Catholic church come to say that the Pope is the Church instituted by Jesus Christ and it is, therefore, it?”)

Now, the church—shall I put it in quotes and capital letters for you?—“the Church” is composed of human beings who are fallible and you remember that. [...]

([Gert:] “Is the Catholic church part of this symbolism?”)

Does the Catholic church know symbolism? [...]

A church, this is separate. [...]

Separate: A fine-arts academy in an area of churches, with a large federal building nearby and a bus stop or terminal.

[...] There is a bus stop in front, and churches in the neighborhood. [...]

He also knows that such channels lead other people away from, specifically, the Catholic church. [...] It worried him when people seem to turn to the material in the same way that they might turn to a church, merely substituting one set of ideas for another, while never experiencing the concepts themselves.

The search for truth in the beginning was carried on within the framework of the church. [...]

The church was a support in the household against his mother. [...]

The Catholic church, incidentally, as he knew it, while admitting the mystic experience, was highly suspicious of him in that regard. [...]

[...] The Church closed its eyes as long as the relationships were sexual in nature. Only when love and devotion were diverted from the Church was there real concern. [...] The Church believed that sexual experience belonged to the so-called lower or animal instincts, and so did usual human love. [...]

[...] The female elements in the Church were always considered suspect, and in the early times of Christianity there was some concern lest the Virgin become a goddess. [...]

The Church did not restrain the sexuality of its priests or the expression of sexuality in previous centuries as much as it tried to divorce the expression of love and devotion from sexuality.

[...] Such situations were overlooked, if not condoned, as long as a priest’s love and devotion still belonged to the Church and were not “squandered” upon the mother of such offspring.

(Pause.) He took the dictums of the church seriously, but questioned them with as much passion and enthusiasm as he overall used in his affiliation with the entire church organization. The church did not like that kind of questioning, and in a fashion it has always been highly suspicious of those who were too mystically inclined, for such people in their originality are not easy to lead. [...]

(Leaning back on the couch, eyes closed:) When Ruburt was a church member, however, the church itself was there, easily identified. [...]

(Long pause.) “The church” was not a hypothetical entity, but was encountered through Ruburt’s experience with the priests who visited, their effect upon his life and his poetry, and with the entire fabric of a young intense daily life. If the church became upset with what Ruburt wrote or read, then Father Ryan burned one of his books, or argued with his poetry, for example, so all of that was living emotional content. [...]

[...] (Long pause.) By the time Ruburt left the church, he thought that it had also lost its emotional pull upon him. [...]

(About the envelope tests — Seth had to be almost omnipotent — because she transferred the authority of the church to him. [...] But the church wouldn’t approve of Seth, I said. Enter the idea of she starting a false church — heretical indeed — with a false god, Seth. [...] I added that since she wanted to use the abilities instead of denying them, as the church would want her to do, she chose to continue her mental rebellion and so had to pay penance physically, through the symptoms. The creative part of her poetry had always been trying to go beyond where the church wanted it to go. [...]

[...] Jane remembered no reaction from her mother when her poetry came into conflict with the church, or when Father Rakin burned her books. [...]

Another episode concerning a church. [...]

(“At a church where we stopped, we listened to choir practice, were surprised that so many young adults were in the choir, instead of small boys or children, commented on the turnabout from what you would expect.”)

G-r-a-n-o-l-d-y. A connection with St. Ambrose, and the church. (Long pause.) Church records kept in a vault in the basement. (Long pause.) Later, much later, a track of some kind was built very near by the church property. [...]

In connection with Boston, there was a street, I believe called Grant, or there was a building called the Grant Building or residence, which was used in connection with a church. [...]

[...] (Long pause.) A Gaylor family was connected with the church. [...]

[...] The church was near the water, and it was visited on occasion by sailors. [...]

[...] She also thought the church’s teachings about motherhood were ambiguous. [...] She thought the church meant that a woman should be either a nun or a mother.

[...] She refused to get a dispensation from the church so she could read certain works. [...]

[...] For some time there was no direct challenge, however, made to the Sinful Self once Ruburt left the church. [...] When his creative abilities found contemporary scientific thought also too narrow, however, and his natural intuitions had led him toward a new framework—one that, again, introduced values having to do with the nature of consciousness, or soul—then the new ideas began to conflict directly with the old buried ones, particularly those that had to do with the conflicts between creative expression, the church, and “forbidden knowledge.” [...]

[...] The church itself, again, had an elaborate system within which the Sinful Self could be at least momentarily redeemed, sins confessed and so forth—so within that system the pressures set up by the entire concept were at least momentarily lessened through such releases. [...]

[...] When Ruburt left that system intellectually some of the old bonding power remained, the emotional glue, but he no longer believed in the indulgences, the sacraments and so forth, so the Sinful Self was left fairly isolated, still believing to some extent that to “be good” it must be bad, but without the releases of guilt once provided by churchly help and belief. [...]

[...] The organization of the church now serves the same purpose I believe.... [...] and this time the church has provided the same kind of organization... [...]

You had a brief life as twins—some definite clear-cut divisions within yourself, have to do with this life when you were one of two—one going one way, and one going the other—one twin had a strong leaning toward military things—a soldier—the organization of the church now serves the same purpose, I believe—security within the organization—the twin who was in the military found his sense of identity as a soldier within the system, but he had great faith in the system—in what he was doing—the other twin was more given to a statesman-like sort of thing—and was in fact an orator, although he had another profession—it included oration to people—the two of you had a very strong telepathic relationship—and this time the church has provided the same kind of organization—you sort of resented the fact that this twin brother of yours had this organization in which he found support and in which he felt so a part because he was absolutely certain of the aims and goals of the organization and he was a good soldier within it—and at that time you envied him that security and that sense of identity within the system in which he believed. [...]

[...] The Sinful Self, however, no longer identifies with the Roman Catholic Church, as once it did, and in years past it also became dissatisfied with that framework. It represents what is left over of Ruburt’s questioning and doubts, those unresolved areas that were emotionally charged not only because of, say, Church doctrine, but intensified because of emotional episodes with his mother, or other such issues. [...]

To a lesser degree the same question applies to any highly inspirational creativity—which, again, has always been questioned by the church organization, which has been firmly against even, say, individual interpretation of the Bible itself. [...]

The idea that our work might set up a new church, therefore, is a very touchy one. [...]

[...] For a while the child could interpret mystical experience within the church — but even then, there was always conflict with church authorities.

[...] Yet leaving the church framework, Ruburt fastened upon the mind as opposed to the intuitions. [...]

(10:19.) Without this experience of following such a belief in the church so fervently, however, he would not understand the need of people for such beliefs, or be able to reach them as well as he does. [...]

[...] He combats the dogma of spiritualism as much as he did the dogma of the church.

Now Ruburt’s paper was largely correct, in that Christianity in general, and the Catholic Church in particular, has not only frowned on revelation, but in the past tried with the utmost effort to strike it down. [...]

[...] There were, however, other reasons also—to do the church some small justice (amused). [...]

The church could not trust revelations, lest new orders might come to contradict the old ones, to upset the spiritual status quo, and hence the social organization that developed about it; or that might revive old tenets once a part of Christianity but later dropped—such as a belief in reincarnation.

Now the church finally placed all of the condemnation of its religious laws against certain psychological and mystical experiences — not because it did not consider them realities, of course, but precisely because it recognized too well the disruptive influence that, say, revelationary experience could have upon a world order that was based upon a uniform dogma.

[...] It was in fact because the church so believed in the great range of psychological activity possible that it was so dogmatic and tireless in trying to maintain order.

[...] (Pause.) There is no doubt that the church cast the soul in a position of stress, caught as it was between its heavenly source and original sin — but there was a sense of psychological mobility involved, one that saw continued existence after death.

The church at that point united the personality however, both parts of the personality agreeing on the definition of good. [...]

[...] In one way the spontaneous self used the church as long as it could, as an outlet for its own rich emotional extension. [...]

[...] While he was in the church the overly conscientious self agreed with the terms. [...]

[...] Through her involvement with the Catholic church, she became aware of the quality called “mysticism” in connection with the saints of that church — but still she had no idea of attributing such a quality to herself. [...]

[...] I don’t think of myself as one at all — not like those church people.” [...]

(I reminded Jane that since she belonged to no religion now [having left the Roman Catholic Church when she was 19 years old], her mystical nature would choose other avenues of expression than religious ones; as in these sessions, for instance. [...]

(After she left the church, she distrusted organized religion in general, and had no idea that her writing would lead to any kind of “mystic experience.” [...]

You must also understand that politics was a legitimate hand of the church in those days, and a churchman was expected to be an excellent politician. [...]

[...] This concerned the position of “the Virgin” within the dogma of the church.