Purification of the Mind

The modern mind has been darkened by over a century of materialism and atheism. These appeal to superficial minds because they simplify, apparently explaining everything in terms of what can be readily perceived. An atheistic mind is a shallow mind and I don't care how clever it may be in worldly terms. It is fundamentally ignorant and self-enclosed. By the same token, a culture that is materialistic and atheistic, as ours has effectively been for decades, makes for shallow minds, minds that are given no chance to grow upwards and expand beyond the world of appearance. What are we to do about this? We have created an intellectual (never mind spiritual) prison that boxes us in and makes us not only dull but little people.

The mind must be given the opportunity to grow in directions that are not currently acknowledged, ones that are dammed up by the dense obstructive nature of materialistic atheism. That much is obvious. When a door is closed tightly shut you cannot go through it and the situation is worse if you don't even see that there is a door that could potentially be opened. And yet this is not enough. The mind must also  be purified. This is because an atheistic mind is a heavily clouded mind, one that has been corrupted with a lie which then spreads throughout the whole of a person's being, tarnishing everything from imagination to sensitivity to motivation. The corruption probably even manifests physically. You purify a darkened mind by exposing it to light and there is no brighter and more cleansing light than that of Christ so I would suggest that the mind can be purified by reading the gospels, specifically the Gospel of John which shines a light from a higher plane.

However, it's not just a matter of reading. It's also how you read. This should be in a properly receptive state with critical faculties in the background and imagination to the fore. Let your imagination be kindled by the story of Jesus, his birth, life, death and resurrection, and also by his words and how he dealt with situations he encountered. Whether that was with suffering humanity or casting out devils or the serpentine mind of the Pharisees that tried to entrap him with their mechanical and empty cleverness. In every situation he responds with intelligence, deep insight, spontaneity and love. There is never the slightest suggestion of a formulaic approach. Everything just flows out of him with complete naturalness.

Unfortunately, the modern mind has become so materialistic that even when it is introduced to spiritual ideas it still retains a lot of its materialism and looks at them through the prism of the materialistic position instead of on their own terms or from the vantage point of the human soul as a spiritual being rather than the product of material forces. This often means that spirituality becomes something to acquire and display for the good of the earthly ego or it has to fit into a pre-existing worldly ethos. Again, this requires purification which can be done through prayer and practising the presence of God but also through reading of works from the past (not just scripture or overtly religious works) written from the assumption that we live in a creation and there is a Creator.

This is the most important thing. Know that there is a Creator and he has a purpose for mankind. He has a purpose for you and that purpose can only be fulfilled when you acknowledge him and open your heart to him. This opening of the heart is actually the expansion of the heart and the mind will follow. The converse is also true. A closed heart produces a closed mind. It is probable that our atheism arose from pride and a self-centred desire to bow to nothing and no one. This we are allowed to do but we must suffer the consequences, and the consequence of denying spiritual reality is that we shrink. We shrink spiritually, of course, but also morally, intellectually and creatively. If we want to rule our own roost, that roost will contract and we will contract with it. As we have done.

We made the mistake of trying to understand eternal realities from a lower frame of reference, the material frame of reference. But matter can never understand spirit and a completely different approach is needed. You cannot begin to understand spirit through material science, through physics or biology or through human-based psychology or analytical philosophy. You must approach it on its own terms and that means you must allow for the possibility of revelation. God has certainly revealed himself in many ways and continues to do so. But the most direct revelation, the one in which the divine manifested in this world without impediment, was in Jesus. Jesus will purify any mind that opens itself up to receiving him.