There are those who are totally convinced and leave it at that. There are those who believe but still have many questions. There are those who are unsure and question, and those who are unsure but don't really want to know. And there are those who refuse to believe. It is this last group that we should take a closer look at.
Total commitment is a barrier to further advancement. We need to ask questions to develop our understanding before we can go forward.
So why does a closed minded Sceptic have such a negative outlook on life, especially in the face of so much evidence?
Why Say No to the Afterlife?
One would think that the possibility of life after physical death would be welcome news. It is only natural to fear death, but isn't the pain relieved just knowing that one will still be aware and close to those they have loved? Isn't it good to be secure in the knowledge that those who have left us are still by our sides and can see and hear all that we do and think? Isn't it wonderful that we can look forward to seeing all our family and friends once again, and forever?
And, what about all the good things of life that we have enjoyed. In the Spirit World these are all remembered and recreated. We can have whatever we want from our bank of memories. Think of the home that you grew up in, and all the love that was given and returned in those surroundings. In a flash it you have it all, just as it was, and as real and solid as you remembered. We can savour forevermore every wonderful moment.
The Street where one lived, the playmates, and old friends, will all come back. The wonder of life, watching everything blossoming in the Spring, the chirping of birds and crickets, the perfume of the flowers, the rustling of a breeze through reeds and trees, the rippling sound of water gently flowing in streams and rivulets, or the thunderous roar of water cascading over falls and mill races; these and everything you ever valued are all waiting for us on the Other Side.
Why then say 'no' to all this?
Could it be that the brick wall sceptic has had so much pain and disappointment in their life that they cannot face the thought of recalling even the better parts of it? It seems true that these dreadful moments also lie in store for those who will not let go of them, for ghostly presences abound in our living World. But I hasten to add that we can release the painful times, and cleanse ourselves of all things bad. Those who have been called in to help such souls to find the Light, report how easy it is, once the reluctant Spirit is shown the way.
Perhaps there is something in the subconscious which will not come to the surface, yet keeps telling the conscious mind that it is better not to know, and to pretend that it need never be faced. This could be something that this individual has done in a past life, or even in the present one. The thought of judgement or retribution might just be too much for that person to face.
This defence is quite useless, for no matter how much they might look forward to a complete black out and eternal sleep when their time comes, as far as we can tell from what mediums have learned, that just doesn't happen.
The question then arises, how many life times of working off bad deeds might it take, for someone who has been utterly evil. Wouldn't it be simpler to toss those wicked energies, like Hitler, Stalin, Bin Laden and Hussein back into the melting pot? Well maybe it doesn't work that way.
The Power of the Sceptic
Before going on to examine the merging of life and spirit in our material world, we should consider and respect the place of the Sceptic in the whole scheme of things.
James Randi is recognised as the foremost exponent of Scepticism, and has been for some thirty years. His work is valuable not only for exposing fakes, but also in making us question phenomena that we might otherwise accept as being true. It is only by questioning and trying to understand what is happening, that we can develop our own individual spiritual knowledge and psychic abilities.
The down side of his investigations though, can discredit the truth and raise doubts, simply because we do not understand everything that is going on, and are helpless to point out why experiments are not working out as they should, when James is present.
When Uri Geller rose to fame in the early Seventies, there appeared to be ample evidence to confirm that he could bend spoons with the power of his mind. Home viewers watching his shows reported that their own clocks had stopped, and some broken timepieces suddenly started ticking away again. When he was tested at the Stanford Research Institute in America leading Scientists admitted that something unusual was taking place. Further telepathic tests were repetitively accurate. Yet, when Uri appeared on an American television show along with James Randi, nothing happened. No matter how hard he concentrated, not a single spoon keeled over.
More recently Scientists have declared that Homeopathy cannot possibly work. They have pointed out that the main ingredients are diluted down to such a degree that there wouldn't be a single molecule remaining in the final solutions. In other words these natural medicines are nothing more than plain water. Yet, facts speak for themselves. Incredibly large numbers of people have been cured after taking them.
Consequently a respected French Biologist, Jacques Benveniste, found that solutions diluted to the same extent as homeopathic medicines still worked. The dilution hadn't reduced the effect that they had on certain blood cells. He named this discovery, "The Memory of Water". After his findings were published in "Nature", the tests were repeated with James Randi present. Just as had happened to Uri Geller in front of a large television audience, it no longer worked.
Since the fact remained that people were being cured, the experiments were tested further by an eminent Scientist. She tried them out on animals, to rule out the liklihood of the successes being due to a placebo effect, and found that the homeopathic medicines still worked even though the animals had no idea that they had been given a medicine.
Once again, James Randi came to investigate, and as with Benveniste, the diluted solutions failed to pass the test.
I don't think that we should cast doubt on the skills of well known Scientists who have tested these phenomena and found them proven. Rather, we should try to understand what is more likely to be happening when a Sceptic is brought into the equation.
If Water does indeed have a memory, then where and how might it be held? We are mostly made of water, and our own memories are surely so vast that they cannot be wholly contained within the confines of our skulls. Or can they? The very fact that telepathy works proves that we can draw on information from outside of ourselves.
The problem with Science is that we still do not know the whole story. Eintstein and the most learned Scientists who have followed him, haven't been able to get to the bottom of it all. They have a number of theories, but at this point in time, none of them have been proven. A startling possibility though, has emerged. There may well be hidden worlds beyond our senses and if this is true, then the big problem of finding "A Theory of Everything" may at long last, be solved. In other words, some leading Scientists now suspect that the Paranormal is an integral part of the Universe we can see, and of an infinite number that we cannot see.
Until the big "All" is revealed and understood, we can only toss more theories around, and wonder if this one or that might be the answer.
We do know that our Universe is balanced with positive and negative energy. We have all also heard much about matter and anti-matter. Unfortunately these names tend to make one think that one side is good and the other bad, whereas they are just opposite sides of the same coin. So let us try to regard each as being as useful and necessary as the other, in keeping everything in order and in perfect harmony.
It is very clear that James Randi's own psychic energy was opposed to that of Uri Geller and Jacques Benveniste. He was most probably backed by a majority of other sceptics who were present, and the scales just happened to swing in his favour. I would venture to say that if all tests and experiments were tried again, in the company of believers, then spoons would bend and the memory of water would be confirmed.
Created on ... April 19, 2003