The individual who coined the phrase "Spark of life" could have put his finger on the true meaning of life and didn’t know it. If mothers had not passed on that "Spark" to her newborn at some point during her pregnancy, there would probably be no life as we know it today. That is only one more reason to honor the supreme status of motherhood in the pecking order of humanity because mothers are the only known originators of life, be it from an egg or other duplication process. Even the cloning process has to pass through a normal transition to receive that spark of life. Without it, the fetuses would be born dead.

The following is the ultimate private question to ask a stranger. "So, what is your religion? Do you really know?" I have asked myself that same question many times? Do I really know? I think so. I’m not sure my religion has a name or title, but I know I have a religion. I believe all men must have some sort of religion, whether worshiping a Deity, money, a stone idol, or anything else. Human life cannot be sustained or controlled in a civilized manner without a superior, unattainable, Icon.

People, by their nature, are fearful of anything they don’t understand, feel or see. They seek protection through religion. Exactly what is religion by man’s definition? Of the nine examples given in my dictionaries, the first one seems to fit my personal opinion closer than any of the others. It reads, "A religion is a set of beliefs concerning the course, nature and purpose of the universe when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observations, and often having a moral code for the conduct of human affairs."

This subject is dangerous for a writer. Politics is the other. People kill over what they perceive to be criticism of their religious views, whether it is true or not. They have very little patience with those who question the existence of their particular form of Deity.

Your religious beliefs are your business unless you elect to share them with others. It is personal and private and one of the things we should be allowed to keep to ourselves without questions by anyone. Many of the extremely devout practitioners have tunnel vision when it concerns their religion and are quick to call those not in accord with their beliefs a heterogeneity of very uncomplimentary names.

My family was probably not typical of most families because we kept our religious feelings to ourselves. No hype. No shouting from street corners, or at the rafters of a building. No thumping of the bible while denigrating others for their lack of affiliation with a certain sect. I know that my mother prayed a lot while both of her sons were in harms way during WW II, asking God to bring us safely home. HE complied. I am not sure about the depth of her religion before or after that. I think I know my mother’s basic religious conviction, but I have no idea where my father stood. That was because he never discussed it and would change the subject quickly when asked. Both parents insisted that we go to the church of our choice as children.

When I told my mother that I wanted to join the Methodist church, she agreed. Frankly, I chose it because my best friend was a member and they had a wonderful summer-camp program that I couldn’t attend if I wasn’t a member. Not the best of reasons, but I went to camp that summer. My parents knew the Methodist preacher quite well and had confidence in him. They became friends when my mother operated a canning plant for the government during the great depression and he and his congregation helped distribute the canned food to the needy.

After I joined the church, my mother and father would attend services if I was on the program, otherwise, they seldom attended church anywhere. They never offered a reason and I never asked. My brother and sisters were all active in one church or the other, but it was never an issue in our family, and seldom discussed. The knowledge that a supreme power was watching over us was sufficient.

Our family acknowledged three different religions, possibly four. Maybe that is what freedom of religion really means. I firmly believe that, if we had a long standing family history with ties to a certain religion from birth to death, (like the Catholic, Jewish or Muslim religions), or some other ethnic attachment, my entire family would probably have been excommunicated, and possibly burned at the stake in the old days. It was important,--- just not the most important thing in our lives. We would have failed the test of most denominations today.

So, maybe that allows me to take an unbiased view. The ardent religious practitioner and the so-so religionist are two versions that probably fit the majority of Americans. However, there is a third group, and they are the people who say they don’t believe in a supreme power of any kind. At least they say they don’t. They represent such a small percentage of the whole that nobody pays much attention to them. They wear their agnostic beliefs as a badge of honor, giving them the right to protest other religious freedoms. In the final analysis, usually when these agnostics reach the last few moments of life, most admit that they had some form of deep-seated religious belief and ask God for forgiveness . There was doubt behind their blasphemes exterior all along. I believe their position is designed to draw attention to themselves.

My personal position is this. I believe in a supreme power and I am convinced that it is the paramount force in my life. I have reservations about some organized religious as such, but there are reasons for that. I realize that there is a large body of people who must have a leader on earth who they can believe in, and that makes organized religion perfect--- for them. A few people like the mediaeval pomp and ceremony of some organized religions. Many people are fearful of change in their lives. Others need a support group to cling to for security, and for them organized religion is the logical answer. In a crises these people have a place to turn to for solace. People needing camaraderie and a source of relationships also fits that category. Without religion, many people would only have two or three friends and a small number of acquaintances. That’s not enough security for them. A house of worship is the logical answer. Everybody cannot be the bell sheep. Some need to follow.

That is my case for organized religion, given strictly from my point of view. My conclusion is that a church atmosphere serves many purposes other than just inspiring individual religious initiative and social stability. It gives the masses a haven for their hearts and minds to rest among peers and be safe in a world full of uncertainties.

There is no question that religion brings social order in a civilized society, or body politic, and that gives us the ability to live together in some degree of harmony. It also gives us the discipline to stay orderly and be civil to each other. If it wasn’t for that discipline, any laws directing order would be futile and people would be killing each other on a whim. Laws are guidelines designed to make nonconformist adjust to the public good and to place liberty at risk for those who fail or refuse to follow those guidelines.

There is a belief among my peers that religion has many frailties. One of them is the blend of politics and organized religion, a dangerous cocktail under any circumstances.

The question comes to mind, exactly how far removed are we, as a civilization, from the barbarous lives of our ancient ancestors? We torture our fellow man without mercy on occasion. We kill each other on impulse. The vanquished live in fear for their lives. People today, of all persuasions, in moments of triumph or despair, tend to revert to animalistic behavior. It seems that they cannot resist or control their brutal instincts or temptations. Do you know that women in Africa are still being sentenced to death by stoning for infidelity?  That begs the question, exactly how civilized are we? How far removed are we from our real animal roots? Although not accepted by the church as such, it is my opinion that it is by divine mandate that the church take a leadership role in the taming of humanity.  Thus far, I don't believe that is being done. 

As the public becomes better educated and more sophisticated in many ways, they demand more freedom of thought, action and personal control. That liberation can create a problem if it reaches the revolutionary stage. It divides people into factions, usually by color, race or conviction and creates hostility. Many times that is also the primary cause for splinter groups to break away from one religion to create another. As a rule the new creation is very close to the original concept. Many times it uses the same doctrine. That is how religions are born and die.

Churches in America are prone to accumulate huge stockpiles of assets that were donated by parishioners for the common good, but instead were used to build splendid buildings as monuments and other investments in lieu of service beyond their constituency to the less fortunate. That happens to be one of my pet peeves. It bothers me to see an ornate church building standing in the midst of poverty and depravation.

Some religions are positioning themselves in political decisions that may be better served by politicians or through the governmental process. Governments are supposedly non partisan and are the only entity that can represent all people equally. It may be that the churches should make their positions known, but go no farther. Opinions expressed by church officials should represent their membership, and the membership should approve all opinions of the church before they are made public by the clergy.

Some churches create divisions between themselves and other religions, not making any attempt to compromise. All of the major religions at one time were small factions, some as small as one or two families who elected to transform themselves into one central church by coming together under a common title, belief and mandate to God.

Some of the churches deliberately create an illusion of inflexibility and superiority over others by declaring themselves the "true" religion. For example, Islam or Judaism have both made declarations by word and deed throughout history that they are each the supreme body of the religious world, and in the case of Judaism, as Gods chosen people over all others. The Catholic church is not far behind. That is not only divisive, but not true. All religious factions have the same claim to resplendence.

Fragmentation is rampant in the Christian religions of the US. The two largest groups are not openly hostile to each other, but the implication is always there that one is superior to the other. The facts are that they are amazingly similar and the competition is for recruiting new members and the finances those members bring to the table.

Many of the lesser religions have designed and billed themselves bastions of faith based on their differences from the majority. Mostly, they survive by not speaking well of the other religions thereby creating an air of exclusivity. The Islamic sector of the world is nearly united under a common thread. Their methodology of fear and peer pressure with absolute submission works to keep their parishioners in line. The deserters from that religion seem to be few. I think that is because of the retaliation potential on them, and their families, including physical, social and mental torture. Punishment of a parishioner by a church can cause severe emotional problems, occasionally with the recipient damaged beyond repair.

Some religions consider others as non-believers (Infidels) and vow to destroy them as enemies. The militant wings of the Islamic religion has Christianity in its sights, and by taking advantage of the disunity in the Christian system, they could ultimately win. That lack of solidarity could be the key.

Individual beliefs are important in the free world where worshipers can still select the worship forum of their choice. Islamic people do not have that luxury. There are factions in Islam too, but the foundation of the church is rock solid in its fundamental beliefs, and all factions are required to honor those beliefs.

The cream of the Islamic intelligentsia usually stays in the background. Those who make the call to worship from the minarets are not the leaders. Their function is to call the faithful to the mandatory prayer on a timely basis.

It would be difficult to change individual Christens to such an extreme concept after practicing freedom of religion all their lives. Parishioners’ minds would have to be channeled to blind faith as the Islamic religions demand. An ideology to be adhered to that obediently and without question would not be acceptable to the average Christian, particularly an American Christian. An attempt to make it so would divide them even more.

Unity among the Christian churches may not be a popular characteristic, but that is exactly what the Christian system had better face today with the radical Islamic war factions forming into battle stations. One way to cause a Christian to fight is to criticize his or her religion. They get mad. It may be time to become infuriated, not just mad.

Like most people, I have a lot of questions for Christendom. I am familiar with most of the stories and opinions as written. I have never read the bible literally word for word as some of my peers claim to have done. That could affect my qualifications to write this epistle. I look upon the Christian Bible as a reference book of parables written for the guidance of the untrained. I find a reference book extremely difficult to read and concentrate on at the same time. It has excellent parallel stories as told by individuals from a different perspectives, and points of view by different people at different times in history. Maybe those people who can and do quote chapter and verse know something that the rest of us don’t know --- or see. I find that their quotes are usually out of context with the whole, and leaves many listeners in a state of confusion. I have doubts and questions about the authenticity and interpretations of some of the material as written. Does that make me an agnostic? I think not.

I call into question the sophistication of the average citizen who lived when Christ was on earth. It is a fact that the literacy rate was extremely low at that time. It was probably confined to a few scribes and the clergy. There were some sophisticated people, most of whom had a great deal of common sense, but even they depended on scribes to read and decipher the few manuscripts available in that era. The general public largely depended on roving minstrels for the news of the day. Scribes wrote it and nobody checked the authenticity of their work. It is conceivable that there were fiction writers in those too. Is that where many of the quotes attributed to some of the biblical scholars could have originated? I am relatively sure that there must have been an average degree of common sense among the people as well, but most of the masses were ignorant, just as they are today in many undeveloped parts of the world.

There is a fine parallel among the general Arab world today because very little has changed from the time of Christ in many of the isolated villages. They are run by warlords and formal education is kept to a minimum on purpose. An ignorant man is easier to control. In many ways, they tend to be child-like and were susceptible to follow like sheep with little effort or resistance.

It is safe to assume that these villagers know enough to exist because they learned the art of making a living mechanically from their elders.

People with that lack of sophistication must be governed. They are incapable of governing themselves. That has not changed over time. Many leaders of the early Christian era maintained their positions by fear and intimidation. The creation of fear, particularly the occult where answers cannot be physically seen and dealt with by force, led to mythological terror that was kept alive by the leaders for their own purposes. A civilization like that was very vulnerable to a clever leader or philosopher, as most leaders were called at that time. Philosopher was the title the Jews give to Jesus Christ. Their failure to recognize his Deity status is one of the primary differences between the Jews and Christians to this day, and as long as they maintain their individual attitudes on the subject, those differences will never be resolved.

Then, what made one religion more attractive than the other?

Previous cultures, like the Romans, Greeks and Egyptians survived and fared well under their state-imposed mythological Gods and Goddesses. Their people were never the wiser.

What made the philosophy taught by one man so much better than the other? Was it personality or charisma? Was it magic? Was it timing created by a bad economy or other extraneous condition? Was it dissatisfaction with the present leadership? Why were the followers of Jesus Christ so sure that he was the right one to lead them to the land of milk and honey? Was it because that is the utopia imagined by most illiterate people? Why was Jesus Christ’ position so stoutly maligned by the faithful of other religions, even to the extent of branding His followers heretics and committing them to horrendous treatment, like being stoned to death or placed in an arena with wild beasts to be ripped apart, or burned at the stake? Could it have been the fear of amalgamation and the ultimate neutralizing of their religious beliefs and blend them into another medium? Were they defending their God, or themselves?

Religions survive because they offer prizes that cannot be delivered on earth. According to their doctrine, the only way to get them is through their path of worship. The Moslems offer no less than 75 virgins and a golden palace to anyone who will voluntarily blow himself up for their militant cause. I’m not sure what the reward is for those who refuse to do it.

Christians offer Heaven as opposed to Hell. Go their way and you are rewarded with a seat at the right hand of God. ( Hearing that phrase so many times made me wonder who is sitting at the left hand of God.) You don’t go their way and you suffer the fires and damnation of Hell. You have your choice. At least you have that in Christendom. Some religions don’t offer a choice.

In years past simple existence was the primary goal for the every-day life of the peasant class, and spiritual belief was the invisible shield protecting that existence. It was also the club that gave power to the few over the many. Religion had nothing else to offer except piece of mind and social order, and I would think that was important to a man trying to feed and protect a family in a hostile environment. Even today, not being alone is a satisfying feeling.

How many true Christians were living during the lifetime of Jesus of Nazareth? There is nothing in recorded history on it that I can find. I would think there were very few, possibly less than a hundred. There were many more people, but very few Christians. Christianity really began to grow with the emergence of stories told by the roaming minstrels in exchange for a crust of bread, a bit of cheese and a mug of wine. I’m sure that an occasional monetary token was welcome also. It is a fact that these human "newspapers" roamed the countryside telling their stories over and over to anyone who would listen, particularly if the listener was a prospect for a gratuity. If the occasion befitted the situation, they would add song to make their presentation more palatable and to keep the listeners attention. A fitting analogy for them would be; Don’t read Shakespear to a plumber. He won’t understand anyway.

I am sure they embellished their stories to fit the circumstance and their audience, just as speakers do today. For example, if there was someone present who challenged the validity of a story, the minstrel would simply build in a situation that was not provable, thus keeping the challenger back on his heels. Our present day documentation is largely the stories from these times, broken down into reference chapters and prose. They were recorded in print, much later. In some cases, centuries later. Like any good writer, the scribes seemed to look for the core of a story and maintain the plot while building around it.

There is no way to know the absolute truth of the stories, but everyone reaches a point in life when some acceptance is necessary for simple mental maintenance. Even today, to challenge the truthfulness of those stories makes you a target for the fear-infected faithful of some religions. People take great exception to anyone questioning their brand of faith as recorded by these ancient scholars. Some people will tolerate no question of the fundamentals of their faith, even if it is built on out-of-context scripture. The faithful will quickly brand you as an infidel or heretic and a sure-fire candidate for another unprovable myth, Hell and damnation. Of course, as a free thinker, that makes me wonder how far removed we are from the people of that earlier era. It appears that the religious page only has one side to most people. It is a place to take credit and to place blame. That takes us off the hook. It also shows that many people are dishonest with themselves.

It is an established fact that the average human mind must have a spiritual refuge to hold it in check, otherwise it would scatter itself throughout the universe and be totally disorganized, thus useless. Because the mind must have a Deity, regardless of the name, the power of life and death and the repository for all in between, good, bad and indifferent. The Deity must be so powerful that to challenge it is to invite destruction in an unimaginable way.

Religion is a safety net for people. It is also a self-haven for the human mind. It allows people to believe that their salvation is in safe hands. That is a human comfort zone.

Then again, there is the suspense factor. Mortals are afraid of many things during their lives, death being only one of them. It is true of all creatures on earth. Did you ever watch a bird feeding itself? It will take a bite, then pop their heads up, looking for danger. Did you ever wonder why wild animals cannot be domesticated easily? The reason is fear and distrust. They are afraid of us and of each other. Man is no different. His fear of the unknown constantly badgers him. Hell is his worst nightmare.

Among the human species, there are fears for the welfare of family members, of hunger, of health, for security, of strangers and for personal safety, and near the top of the list of fears is that of darkness. There are many more. Most of those fears can be neutralized for a while, like daylight will neutralize fear of the night until night comes again. Regardless, many fears never go completely away. Some cannot be placated easily. Severe stage freight by seasoned performers is commonplace. Some speakers get physically ill before taking to the stage and throw up in the industry. I get very apprehensive that I have forgotten something before I make a speech, and that something bad is about to happen. Comedians fear silence after a joke more than anything else. All people, when placed in that situation fear inattention. Most use an entirely different voice on stage. That seems to calm the apprehension to some degree. Television is the worst of the lot. The best cure is laughter or applause by an audience.

The fear of death is the ultimate trepidation among all animals. It cannot be turned off like a light switch. It is ever present. We use religion to protect us from those fears by saying a prayer. Yet we are afraid of many things in religion to some degree. Paradoxical, is it not?

At this point I want to tell you a little about my opinions on death. The question is do you die when your body ceases to function, or do you continue in some form or other. Here are a couple of examples that should create thought. I am not sure whether I believe in reincarnation or not. I have several reasons why I should. The first time I became aware that there may be life after death was when a lady told us of her experience. Here is what happened.

My company was involved in a very large land transaction a few years back, and we had to work all night on the contracts because some of the principals were leaving town the following day. The law firm brought along two secretaries to type the contracts as the attorneys finished each page.

During a break, about three in the morning, one of the ladies, made a remark that sounded like, "When I died while my daughter was being delivered." Needless to say, the room became quiet in a hurry. I asked her to repeat the statement. I was sure it was made in jest, even though we were all too tired for jokes.

This was her story, and she assured us that it was no joke. I was to enthralled to ever forget it. She said that during the birth of her second daughter, which was by cesarean section, her heart stopped and all life functions ceased. She didn’t realize it had happened. Her first inkling that something was different was when she became aware of a flurry of activity and loud voices in the operating room. She could see people scurrying around a hospital bed with a body laying on it. That was when she realized that she was observing all of this from a point above the group and the body on the hospital bed was hers. That didn’t frightened her because she felt a strange and overpowering calm. She watched all of the activity below with a great deal of fascination. She noticed that she could even see things that were happening outside of the room. For example, she saw a nurse rush outside of the room to get something for a doctor. It was a large syringe The nurse dropped one in her haste and had to get another from a cabinet.

After a while she seemed to feel herself drifting away toward intense white lights that seemed to be located in a large tunnel. She was not afraid, and was totally at peace with herself, no pain, no worry, no anxiety, nothing. She said she just seemed to float toward the light. She said the strange part of the experience was that she actually wanted to go into the tunnel of light, even though she had no idea where it led.

When she reached the proximity of the entrance to the tunnel, a clam and compassionate-sounding voice called her name. She didn’t remember seeing anyone, but felt a presence next to her. The voice told her that she had to go back, that her family and new baby needed her there now. She actually wanted to argue with the voice, but she couldn't talk.

The next thing she knew, she was in the recovery room coming back to reality. Even though she remembered every detail of the experience, she was not sure whether it was a dream or not, so she elected to keep it to herself. Circumstances changed that later.

She worried about the experience for several days. She still didn’t tell anyone for fear that she would be ridiculed. Maybe it was a dream caused by the anesthesia. Maybe it was just an ordinary dream, but then again, how could she have seen all that was going on in and out of the operating room.

A day or two later, her Doctor said to her, "Mrs. ______,I would like to make a few tests before you are released to go home. I guess your husband told you that we nearly lost you on the table. You went into cardiac arrest before we could do anything about it, and we had to move quickly to save you. You were clinically dead for nearly 11 minutes. We kept oxygen pumped into your lungs, but we still want to be sure you didn’t suffer brain damage, if that’s all right with you. We have talked to your husband, and he agrees".

She said she still hesitated to tell him, but decided that she needed to do it. She said, "Doctor, I know that I died. I watched all of you running around in the operating room trying to save me. I saw that nurse when she ran to another room outside of the operating room. You yelled for a syringe of something. Did you know that she was so nervous that she dropped the first one? I thought she was going to bring it anyway, but she threw it away and got another one from the cabinet. She was in such a hurry that she nearly dropped it also. I saw a lot of other things that happened in the operating room before I left."

She told him several other observations she had made from her unique position above the table.

She said the Doctor was astounded. He said, "There is no way you could have seen those things from your position on the table."

She said, "I told you, I wasn’t on the table, I was watching the whole thing from someplace up near the ceiling, and I could see through the walls."

She said the Doctor got very excited and asked her to record the full story on tape , and he would like to have several colleagues who were in the operating room at the time verify that they were doing what she said they were doing when it happened. She agreed, and the record was made for our records.  That tape is a part of her medical records.

Needless to say, we were also spellbound by the story, but we had to go back to work. It was difficult to keep our mind on the matter at hand for a while after that.

Since that time there have been books written on this subject and numerous similar cases have been documented paralleling her experience. There seems to be a common thread running through all of them, the bright tunnel of light, the desire to go on and not return to life, and seeing things that should not have been seen. It seems that there have been thousands of "out of body" experiences and most people are reluctant to talk about them. I can't blame them. People generally are suspicious and fickle at best.

We will never know if that spark of life energy evolves into something else when it departs from our body, or how it works. There is little dispute that an aberration or something with unusual power manifests itself from time to time in the form of a human and exposes itself to those on earth. We don’t know how or why, and it won’t tell us. My own wife saw an elderly couple standing near our bed recently. The time was early in the morning. My wife is not prone to make things up. I believe she actually saw an aberration of some sort. We have no idea of who or why they were there. We live near a Civil War battlefield where massive casualties were incurred by both sides. A friend of mine, now departed, claimed that he regularly would wake suddenly and see a Civil War soldier standing at the foot of his bed. He said they would look at each other for a few minutes, then the aberration would slowly disappear. He claimed that he did not experience any fear of the fellow.

In another similar situation, an employee of a local charity was having some problem at her home. When she came home from work, she would find all of the pictures of her ten-year-old son removed from the walls and furniture where she left them. They would be thrown on the floor, but not broken. Her son went from school directly to a friend’s house and she picked him up to go home after work. The chances of it being him were negligible. Other incident happened while they were at home, one being brightly lit pictures of native American women floating through the dark. She became very frightened and told the story to a friend. The friend called me, claiming that, as a writer, I might know something about such things. I called a friend who had told me that his Pastor performed exorcisms. I put the people together. He "exorcized" the house, and the aberrations disappeared. They have not returned. The Pastor seemed to think that the house was built on an ancient Indian graveyard. That makes me wonder about my electrical theory that activity stays around after death, even that long time.

I have met several people who have had past-life experiences similar to that described by our secretary, and some who have had anomalies, or ghosts, present themselves, usually at night, when they wake the human from a deep sleep. Seldom are these group sightings by the humans. Usually a single human will see one or more ghosts and it will disappear within a very short time. I have never met anyone who received a message or instructions from an anomaly. Occasionally noise will accompany a sighting.

The sincerity of the people who see these things cannot be doubted, nor their sanity questioned. Revealing their experiences was not done for profit, and their reticence to exploit the experience is noteworthy.

There is a power out there someplace and we don’t know what or where it is or from whence it comes or goes once it leaves. It is supposedly measurable with sensitive electrical instruments. That opens the question again, that electrical energy is closely involved with life. I am not talking about the routine ghost story. It could very well be that a high percentage of ghost stories are figments of someone’s active imagination or dream. I know for a fact that animated dreams have been going on for more than two hundred years because I have documents to prove that. I am sure there is documentation in the Vatican library and other repositories that cover many more years than my proof. I estimate that a small percentage have credence and when investigated by credible people, survive the test.

What happens to the electrical impulse of life in those souls, if it refuses to go the route of the others? Even they can’t describe the so-called ‘other side’ that we hear so much about? Some have tried, and their stories are amazingly similar to the one related by our legal secretary. Could it be because they heard it from someone else and simply adopted the story format? Scientists know that there is an electrical impulse running through all human bodies, but they have not proven that the electrical impulse is the motor that drives life. They can insert wires and equipment to alter its course in the body and make it do things like rhythm control of the heart muscle and stimulate or change certain parts of the brain. We have a knowledge gap there that needs to be explored.

I am sure that in some deep, dark laboratory, maybe in the black forest, there are scientists researching this knowledge gap right now. They are keeping it quiet because of the ridicule it would bring down on their heads if they are wrong. I would be the same way, except for the fact that I couldn’t keep my mouth shut. The time element for me to keep a secret is measured in minutes or seconds. Certainly not hours or days.

It is doubtful that we will never know where the soul goes after death. I don’t believe it takes any memory with it or it would contact someone left behind. As there is nothing physical in the transfer, it is logical to assume that it goes alone, wherever it goes. There are many speculations and theories. Some of them are used to start new religions. Similar stories are derived from the fables of old as told by those traveling minstrels of long ago. They created a scenario that could not be disputed because the listeners had no way to determine the difference. Surely the question about the soul was asked of the minstrels, and the minstrel had to have an answer. When there is no proof to the contrary it is best to create one. Their claim for the route of the soul after death is generally accepted as the truth, and besides, the minstrels said it first.

I believe that the soul (A hyperbole ) once released from a body does leave the earth by some unknown means of conveyance to a place we know nothing about. What form it takes after leaving is pure conjecture. Some accept the belief that the soul is a minuscule bolt of electrical energy that originated from the mother at birth and is used to hold the body in form during its tenure on earth, then, when the body wears itself out and dies and the energy is released to the vast unknown. We don’t know that it is not reassigned to animal, beast, fish or foul after it is used by us. As it apparently has no memory, it cannot tell us anything of its past. Apparently its purpose on earth is to fuel the body after it was created from a DNA map of the mother that came with the origin of the species and was passed down from prodigy to prodigy. Evolution, or the need to continue environmental development, makes up the rest. The human creature must adapt to its survival requirements. Man needed arms and hands to feed himself, so he grew them. He needed legs to transport himself, so he grew those. The same is true with every animal on earth, bird in the sky and fish in the sea. Nothing is left to chance. It grew out of need and necessity to compete for life on the planet. Some animals, including humans, have useless appendages, but you can bet, at one time in the past they were needed for survival, or they wouldn’t be there. Human examples include toes and functional looking breasts on the male species. Time will remove or modify them.

The electrical impulse frequently mentioned here must be another form of energy not known to us. I am reasonably sure it is not the regular AC/DC current we have knowledge of and can measure and use with a great deal of accuracy. Its development could be the answer to space travel. If a human, sans body, could be reduced to a soul, and then regenerated into form, it is entirely possible that the soul can travel through space at many time the speed of light without harm, then can reignite life in a form to fit the atmosphere of another planet, the problem of interplanetary travel could become a reality. Presently, light-years away instantly tells the earthly human that it is impossible to travel those vast differences in a single lifetime. The seed to that research is electrical knowledge. The question is; what is a soul and how does it operate? Because it is unknown, we have no alternative but to believe that the knowledge is out there someplace, and God has the answer. If He releases it into the mind of one individual, that person will become the most knowledgeable person on earth. Will that be the Christ we hear about? Will He return to earth with the answers?

People and other animals live off of each other. A surgeon would starve without patients. A lion would die of starvation without other animals to eat. A policeman would not be needed if there was no crime. A postman would be surplus with no mail to deliver. Beef and pork are staples for the human diet. In some instances, we could survive without eating each other, but it is so convenient to do it this way. How well we survive depends on the need for our services by others. If we can make our services more attractive than the next fellow, we will prosper to the detriment of those who have nothing to offer. The same goes for religion.

The minstrels, or story tellers, of the old days had to keep their listeners entertained as well as believing that they were telling the truth or they would have lost all credibility—and personal maintenance.

I am sure many of the stories of the day were serialized. The next time the minstrel came around he would be expected to add to the story with a new chapter, similar to the serial movies in the old days. A new chapter would be shown at the local theater each Saturday and many children could hardly wait to see it, me included.

Story tellers of the post Jesus Christ era wouldn’t have needed authorization to create biblical related stories. Being privy to only scant historical documentation, we cannot say definitively one way or the other on most religious matters, but we can assume that they took the lessor of all evils to win their listeners. With no ‘national news’ per se at the time, religion was the only value to which an illiterate peasant could relate.

In the ancient world, older people were revered as all wise. If one of these older people repeated these stories to following generations, and even if they embellished it some, either to make it more interesting, or because of lack of memory. You can see how their stories would be accepted as gospel or truth. The revered did not lie.

There is a simple test to prove that reliance on the human memory is a questionable practice. It goes like this:

Line up ten normal people, preferably of about the same age, side by side, two feet apart. Show the first person a message, something like, "John took the olive tree from the garden and sent it to Saul to be cut into lumber. It has not been returned to date." Take away the written message after the first person has studied it for about ten seconds. Ask the reader to whisper the exact message into the ear of person number two, then two to three until the message has passed through all ten people. Ask the tenth person to write the message on a pad, exactly as he or she heard it from the ninth person. Usually you will find the message to be considerably different from the original message given to person number one. That example will graphically show what can happen when verbal communication is transmitted between people with no script. That is probably what happened to most of the stories of the bible. The general theme, or core of the story, was followed because it was used extensively, but the details were partially embellished, misinterpreted and quoted completely out of context. Whatever the reason, the message will probably be garbled.

The world is divided into religious territories with no physical lines on the maps. Each religion teaches that theirs is the best. In that respect, they are in league with a businessman. If you don’t claim to be the best, you will always be subordinate to your competitor.

Religion creates wars. Yes, I said religions. One way or the other, one religion is always in disagreement with the other(s). Whether one feels threatened by the other, or it is purely territorial, the fundamental reason for the disagreement is religion based. An excellent late day example is Bosnia where one religious faction mercilessly starved and slaughtered the other, even after they had lived peacefully together in the same block in some cases and attended the same schools, for many years. Islam and Christendom are also good examples. Of course, Hitler and the Jews is probably the best example of persecution because of religion.

Some will claim that it is unfair to catagorize religion in that manner. Hitler tried to eliminate the Jews and Judaism because they were Jewish. Judaism is the religion of all Jews and has been despised by other religions for centuries because of its autocratic attitude about Jesus Christ. In some areas, that attitude creates hate and revile of a nature seldom experienced. Anti-Semitism is extensive in many areas of the world to this day, as it has been since the first century. I can understand the Jewish fear and trepidation at such a characterization and why they want to fight back. It makes no difference how sharp the sword, to attack the unseen is a chancy business.

Recorded history reveals that religion is the primary cause of all of the differences between us. If it were not for religion, what would it be that divides us? Our human features are basically the same. The accouterments are similar, used primarily to protect our dignity. We all have two arms, two ears and one nose. Our skin color is derived from evolutionary locations and our mental capacity is usually derived from the genetic makeup of our ancestry. Otherwise, we are basically the same. All humans like the cozy-comfort of peace and security that religion offers. Religion creates fashion, social order, relationships, pride, fears and affects all aspects of our daily lives. That is because we must have that unknown imperious power out there somewhere to look for guidance and protection. Whether it is exactly as portrayed in print is a matter for individual interpretation. I strongly suspect that there is something, somewhere, that listens and leads us on a path that keeps us on an even keel. That must be a Deity. We call our Deity God and to reach Him, we go through His Son, Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ was an occupant of earth. His existence is surrounded by fable, mystery and fact. We know He was here because it is an established fact, witnessed by many. What He did here is a matter of some conjecture because He was here only a short time as an adult. We know that He was able to accumulate a number of followers and convince them that His was the way to that great unknown salvation somewhere in the broad expanse of the universe. A series of events were staged to reinforce that belief, like His challenges of the system and the miracles attributed to Him as told by His followers, He was a willing victim of tyranny to prove a point, even though He seemed to have some doubts at the last moment when He asked His God why had He forsaken Him.

Then there was the disappearance of His body from the crypt. Many people think that was to create the illusion that He had gone to that great beyond in body as well as spirit, therefore no search would be made to find the body. Some people also have some reservations about that to this day. A few religions of the world fiercely disavow it as a means used by Christians to elevate Him to Deity status. Personally, I think the body was simply moved during the night by believers to protect it from defilement by the power factions who realized too late that they had created a martyr, and they wanted to destroy the illusion before it spread. Isn’t that logical?

I have had people tell me that their primary goal in going to church is to meet the "right" people. I had a close friend who sent his son to Sunday School on a regular basis so the boy would be exposed to people who could do well by him later in life. I asked him why he chose that particular church and his answer was exactly as I expected it would be. That church had the right mix of people to enhance the career opportunities of his son.

The lesson here is that the church also serves other functions than religion, and some people go to church for that reason. Business men go to get business, politicians to get votes, girls to get husbands and young men to meet future wives. Many others go to satisfy a personal need that has created a void in their lives. Another is the opportunity to wield some little bit of power over others by achieving a certain egotistical leadership status in the congregation. Those are usually people who have never had an opportunity to exercise authority otherwise. Another reason, and probably paramount among all, is the fear of going to Hell after death. Fear of what will happen to their soul after it leaves their body. They know what will happen to the body. It will be buried or cremated and return to the earth in some form. It is the soul that they are worried about, so lets talk about that for a moment.

As I explained, nobody can define what a soul really is, or even if there is one. It could be that the electrical impulses that generate the steam to run the body engine simply goes out like a light or a snuffed candle when the oxygen fuel is removed or disrupted. It also might be that the electrical energy of the soul simply dissipates into the stratosphere. We don’t know, and no mortal will ever know. The fear that something terrible will happen to this unknown part of our psyche causes us to tremble in our boots when any suggestion to the contrary of going to Heaven is advanced. When one person says to another that they will Pray for each other, it is a resurgence of support from human to human. It is a good feeling and well worth the effort. Even though I don’t know what happens to the soul, or even if there is one, I do know that something causes the human body to ignite into life in the womb and continue with that life until it extinguishes itself one way or the other through death. People gather in groups before death to wish the person making the transference a safe journey. It is normally a sobering feeling when the light of life has gone out for one person you know and you will see them no more. The subsequent ceremonies are simply to console those left behind.

The holder of a soul is not going to take any chances. They are going to do everything possible to steer it to the best possible end. Some claim to know the answer to death. Others think they know. Still others wish they knew and then there are some like me, who really don’t worry about it because, wherever it goes, something or somebody will be waiting for it and point the way to the next assignment. That somebody will be God.

Yes, to me there is a God and one of the most profound statements ever made about Him is that He acts in mysterious ways. Popes and Kings have claimed divine rights from time to time in history, but are they really instruments of God or men? We don’t question it because we don’t know the answers.

So, now we know. A human is not a sacrosanct medium. It must have an unattainable goal hanging over it and be servile. Without that fear of the unknown, people would be uncontrollable monsters.

Religion was the instrument that the world depended on to calm the savage beasts. It has not worked well, even with the human species. The beasts continues to run wild without restraints until somebody knocks it back to reality. That is war. The church has tried to provide those restraints, primarily in the middle ages, but it was limited to a single organized religion, and that was brutal punishment to the people, because, like every authoritarian creation, the narrower the authority, the stricter the punishment. Even with that brutality there were questions about whether it was for religion or power. Whatever it was, it passed into oblivion as all brutal system do. A political system can get so imperceptive to what is happening around it that it loses its balance, and must eventually fail. Religion is supposed to be above that fallacy because the leader (God) cannot be fired, defeated in an election or overthrown. If He could, the consequences of being a human would be a total disaster.

Situations like those in our inner cities in the US and many other areas of the world today where worship of a Deity has given way to stimulants and other narcotics as a replacement. Worship, under those circumstances, is a hollow show for the benefit of other humans.

We know that attitude has a lot to do with health. Health is the single value that a human has that is theirs alone. Medicine is a help, but is only a part of the total equation. Many eons ago, man realized that to appeal to a higher power for relief is the final answer to health. That appeal is prayer and without it, man would go into the unknown forest naked and alone.

Like most of you, I believe God has disciples on earth. These are the people not filled with hate and doubt and generally express themselves with action and words. They know, by some unknown intuition, that the God we worship is in control of the world and their assignment is to implement His wishes. It is said that God comes in many forms and shapes. He is worshiped by many different people in their own way, and by using many different names, but at the apex of the human triangle is the one master of the universe. However, men who consider themselves godly, appear to accomplish more that those who simply consider themselves mortal. Alexander the Great and the Caesars of the Roman empire are examples.

We stand in awe. I have given you every excuse in the world for you to say that you don’t believe in God. I am willing to bet that not a single person jumped ship. You see, God is as necessary to you and your everyday life as air is for your lungs and body. You cannot exist as a whole human without that domain of power to keep you civilized, sane and communicable with your fellow man. You can exhibit all of the bravado in the world, but that does not negate the fact that something out there, or up there if you wish, is watching over this world, now crawling with humanity, and guiding it in a direction of hope and prosperity. That is what He is doing for you. What are you doing for Him? I think it bothers Him greatly when we break off on our own and try to make it without Him. If you listen closely, you can hear His murmur in the recesses of your mind, "Come back, my friend. All is forgiven." You call it a feeling of guilt for being disobedient. It is not. It is a sincere call asking you to come back to the fold.

Regardless, the question will always remain. How did humans know to celebrate the existence of a Deity when there was no communications between them and the other inhabitants of the world? What made them follow the exact same pattern of the others? How did that happen?

The reference Book (Bible) contains many secrets that are yet to be found and explained. There may be coded messages that we have not deciphered yet. The quatrains (four line poems) of Nastradamus contain some unanswered questions. You are carrying some questions personally that you would prefer to remain private and nature itself poses many more questions. Some questions were put in your mind at His command. Whether you received them consciously or subconsciously, they were put there for a reason. One that we will probably never know. These are our guides to a better and more civilized life from the bible. Now, all we have to do is practice what He preached.

I am not sure whether I believe in reincarnation or not. I have several reasons why I should.