“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

Now: even as a young person, Ruburt was the type of person who was considered out of place, rebellious, or even slightly dangerous in any Roman Catholic congregation—particularly in the time of his own youth.

(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. To some extent later, even when it was a worthy opponent, Ruburt could see where his own ideas fit in or did not. There was only so much leeway granted, so much questioning allowed—for beyond a certain point of course the entire dogmatic structure would fall apart.

(Long pause.) Many other people were making that same leap at that time in your society. He was far from any scientist, of course. He did poorly in science in college, for that matter, for if his mind was too scientific for religious dogma, it was too creative and emotional for conventional scientific thought.

[Ray] Bradbury’s stories, for example, are actually tales of a religious moralist. When you fear that man will most certainly destroy himself through his misuse of technologies, then you are expressing the same feeling in different form expressed by the religious attitude—only religion’s devils are turned into technological devices. So Ruburt’s belief in the Sinful Self went underground in those years.

The creative abilities must revolve largely about man’s definition of himself, his source and purpose, and all of your Western literature and art has revolved about the concept of the Sinful Self in one way or another. The Shakespearean plays are an excellent case in point, even when they concern even older heritages, so the creative artist in any field has certain creative traditions that become classic models for his art and that of the world.

The church can excommunicate you. Science in its position of authority can mock those who disagree with it. Ruburt’s basic beliefs of the Sinful Self were formed in childhood, individually interpreted through his own experience, given strong emotional validity in other words, and emotional charge.

(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.

Ruburt’s creative abilities still had those classical models, yet because of his mind’s originality and his natural intuitive nature; those creative abilities were also fueled by unofficial information: he was always to some extent in strong connection with the knowledge possessed by his natural person—and that knowledge kept seeking expression. Its expression directly contradicted first religious then scientific precepts. It kept seeking a larger framework for its own fulfillment and expression, of course, and at the same time it seemed to Ruburt it brought about further dissension. It made him more of a rebel.

It took some time before such a framework began to develop—a kind of double one—represented by my work and by his own—an excellent accomplishment, of course. Also an accomplishment that clearly stood out as a direct challenge to religion and science, that not only contradicted their theories but offered an alternate framework through which reality could be experienced.

(9:34.) Through the last few years religious fundamentalism has begun to grow, bringing to the forefront in exaggerated form many of the old beliefs with which Ruburt thought he had dispensed so neatly. Science, if it bothered, might label him a fool, but fundamental religion could label him as evil, or claim his work was inspired by the devil in Christian terms, and so the old beliefs in the Sinful Self or evil self were activated.

(Long pause.) They had always been present, of course. He did not admit those feelings, however. They were pushed back further and further. They seemed especially humiliating in the light of what he thought his public position should be. They inspired all the doubts. I want it understood that those feelings nevertheless were often used as creative propellants. The other material recently given on the Sinful Self should be kept in mind along with this session.

Of course, the experience represents an important point of progress, as do the dream intentions. The release of those feelings will clear the air in all areas, allowing the insights of the natural person new freedom so that new needed information at all levels can flow into his experience.