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Friday, October 31, 2014

Pope Francis Has Now Asked the Christians to Enhance their Biblical Concepts of Creation: The Urantia Book is Getting Vindicated!

When I read the news regarding the views expressed by Pope Francis regarding the Biblical story of creation, I felt happy. 


I felt happy because this great religious leader now has honestly opened up to express some of his convictions even though there is an apparent danger of his views offending the hardcore biblical beliefs of a good majority of the common followers of the catholic church that he heads.

But what did he say? He said that evolution is real and God has not created us with his magic wand. He said that the big bang theory and the evolution theory of creation are not essentially contradicting the Biblical story of creation.

And that is exactly what the Urantia Book revealed to us some sixty years ago when it got published for the first time. 

That is what I have been writing after I became a reader and a student of the Urantia Book in the recent years, just as those few millions of intelligent men and women of this world. As the Urantia Book has several celebrity readers and silent followers, there is all possibility that the present Pope too being a reader and student of it all these years!

Many of those readers have been trying to educate their fellow beings about the great truths revealed to human beings by none other than the agencies of God Almighty Himself. But, unfortunately, the majority of humans of the present day though living in an age of scientific discoveries, have not really achieved the mind capacity to receive advanced truths! 

By the way, did you read the news about what the Pope said?

If not, click this link to read it in the Washington Post: "Pope Francis says evolution is real and God is no wizard (magician)"!

These Flowers Are Not Magically Created!
They Are the Outcome of Divine and Human Work!

I have been writing blogs on this aspect in this forum for quite some time. Unfortunately, there are hardly any takers for reasons I just told.

Just a couple of months ago, I wrote an imaginary letter in the name of a group of invisible authors of some of the papers of the Urantia Book based on the revealed knowledge that is contained in this book. [ Read: A Letter to All Humans!] If you haven't read it, try to read it. You would know what the Pope is telling now. 

In case you have the curiosity, try to read the Urantia Book based essays in this blog site. 

The catholic church is now slowly admitting their belief in evolution.  Only a couple of months ago, one of their official sites called the Catholic Answers banned and blocked me for introducing some facts about the Urantia Book. 

But the Urantia Book is not telling Darwin's flawed theory of evolution, but it is telling the true fact of evolutionary development of material worlds and material beings that is termed as the controlled evolution! It was through controlled evolution that the first humans of earth got developed for the first time about a million years ago on this earth. It also explains the constitution of the grand universe comprising of the dark energies and the material domains and the manner in which the fundamental material particle, electron, is composed from the ultra fundamental ultimatons!

However, neither the Catholics nor the scores of the other churches have acknowledged the existence of the Urantia Book officially, even though the book and its contents have been in the public domain for decades. Neither is it got any worthy attention of the present day media. But, such things are not any thing surprising for the readers of the Urantia Book!

I am hopefully sure that this would change in the due course of time. It has to. Because the plans of God for earth cannot be restrained by humans nor any of the invisible and rebellious orders of beings

I am happy that the present Pope has already paved the way to initiate a discussion that would eventually bring the revealed truths of the Urantia Book to the attention of more and more of the people of our times which would result in some positive dynamics for changes in human thoughts. They might eventually get adapted to accept absolute truths willingly.

If you have read this with an open mind, you are likely to agree with me. 

Thursday, October 30, 2014

Some Hard to Believe Truths About the Children Who Occupied the First and Last Benches in Schools!

Today morning a cousin shared a truth that he or some one else like him might have experienced in life through the latest real time messaging application now familiar to all as WhatsApp : The message read like this:

"First bench doing job and last bench doing business. Truth of school life. A first bench student knows the answer to every question (problem), but the last bench student knows how to face every problem!"

Yes, there are enough examples that you could find to prove that this is true.

I too am too tempted to agree with this statement wholly and wholeheartedly.

During my school days, I have been more-or-less one of the first type who sat on the first bench mostly always. We were the so-called class toppers who were the pampered best students of the teachers. We were often the role models our teachers pointed to our not-so-fortunate back bench sitters. We hardly got an opportunity to notice the faces of those sat behind us in the back benches. The last bench ones were not the favorites of the teachers, but they were no doubt our heroes! Because, they were good at many things that we could hardly think of accomplishing in those days, other than perhaps scoring the marks in the test papers.

Rose Garden in a Private Suburban Indian School Campus!
Thrust Mainly towards Screening High Scoring First Bench Sitters and
Weeding Out the Low Performing Last Bench Sitters!

Perhaps, that could be one reason that I tried to change my image during my senior days with a bit success. In fact that helped me to experience the advantages of both to some extent!

But being nurtured for the first bench, I was bound to become a servant or naukar doing service or naukari and I became an accomplished naukar among the vast group of such naukars all around. But with my bits and pieces of last bench experiences, I could no doubt notice the poor slavish state of minds that my colleagues mostly possessed with little scope for trying out any new things even if it could make their own lives much better.

They were not trained to face challenges. They have been trained to follow the established legacy of work culture as per instructions only! Most of our bosses too were not much different, because they too were only naukars with a little bit more accomplishments than the rest of us!

Many of us, during the course of our naukari acted the double role of dogs and gods! We understood nothing more than that, to be very frank. We kept remembering our school teachers and our over ambitious parents who either patted or scolded us for keeping us the disciplined children who never ever ventured to question the established ways of knowledge and culture.

In India, our colonial masters needed literate servants in limited numbers and hence the schools that produced such servants were much less in number during the formative years of young nation. But later, the demand rose and we created more and more such schools and educational institutions that continued with the same methodology of teaching and training!

So we had only teaching and training institutions catering only those in the front benches. We cared little for the back and last bench ones. But fortunately, among them were the ones who did not need any formal teaching and training. Among them were the few borne leaders who mastered the skills to face problems instead of selecting stereotyped answers to problems!

I had been an admirer of those who sat in the back benches. Some of them could turn their initial misfortunes to great fortunes in later years. How can I forget the back bench heroes of our times?

Dhirubai Ambani, Bill Gates, Jack Ma etc lead the long list. On the other hand, we the disciplined and well liked ones who occupied the first benches kept doing our servant roles receiving the ten chakrams of Padmanabhadasa. 

I am not telling that servants like us are not required. We are indeed the work force who are doing the jobs. All kinds of jobs!

But regrettably, we are more in numbers than the job opportunities for us to act. We do not know how to create jobs. We only know how to do the jobs that are demanded from us. When we are in great numbers than the job opportunities, the demand for us goes down and as a result our value too!

So those of us of the first bench sitters either struggle to get jobs or struggle to get more value for our jobs.

But the few who sat behind us face our problems differently in a way that we never understood in the beginning until they told us the details. And we find them making value and wealth in such a manner we never could understand well.

So they keep staying as our heroes. We envy them  and secretly tell all bad things about them out of our envies.

But we need more of them for us to think and act differently. We need more of them to lead us. Without them we cannot do our service! We need them to tell us what to do! They are our entrepreneurs and business men. They are the job creators. They are the ones who find ways of creating wealth and enabling us to work! We need them in right proportions among us. Those naturally getting developed by sitting in the back benches are not enough. We really need more of them.

But how can we possibly make more of them? Can any of us of us of the first bench type be made to be like them? What should we do in our schools?

Any ideas ?

Crystalline Magnesium Sulfate: Why is it called Epsom Salt? Should We Keep it at Home?

Today morning one of my chemical engineering batch mates of the nineteen seventies, forwarded me a web knowledge piece link which helped me in refreshing some long forgotten facts about the usefulness of a commonly available household ingredient of my childhood days. 

This is magnesium sulfate, which is generally known as Epsom salt. Now-a-days, people do not hear much about this, but it is a common ingredient in many of the value added remedies and skin conditioners marketed by the several pharma and cosmetic companies in various countries. During my childhood days, this name was very familiar for various reasons.

I thought of sharing this information with those of my readers who might be interested to know more.

Epsom salt is called so, because it used to be obtained commercially from the mineral spring waters of a place called Epsom in the United Kingdom.

Magnesium sulfate is a crystalline compound of magnesium, sulfur and oxygen with its chemical formula MgSO4. During crystallization Magnesium sulfate entraps seven molecules of water and hence, the common crystalline Epsom salt has the formula MgSO4.7H2O.

Detailed information about this chemical can be obtained from the Wikipedia article on Magnesium sulfate.

Uses and the benefits of Epsom salt can be obtained from the website of salt works.

The Sea Water is the Source for 
Many Salts Including Magnesium Sulfate

Those who are desirous of using this salt for various house hold health uses, especially as a skin conditioner, can have a look at this web page for the many fold health uses of Epsom salt. More such information can be seen in this wikihow page on the uses of Epsom salt.

Epsom salt can be used for use in float tanks at home for those who are interested in having a dead sea experience at home with the added advantage of stimulating their nerves, body and skin. Float tanks are bath tubs using an concentrated Epsom salt solution in place of water. You can have more information about this in this Wikipedia article on isolation tank (float tank). Float tanks using Epsom salt solution helps people to float in the water tub and it is medically proved to have beneficial effects in reducing body pains, stress and improving skin condition.

There are many advantages if we keep some Epsom salt in ready stock in our homes. Some of the advantages are given in this web page. 

There are several industrial chemical suppliers in India who either produce this chemical or market it. This web page gives a list of such industrial suppliers of Epsom salt in India.

It may be of some use to learn more about this substance and its uses. Now it is possible for us to get this salt and its related items and information books online from online suppliers like Amazon India. [Get Epsom salt and info books from Amazon !]

It may be interesting to know that people in many Western nations use products commonly known as bath salts for mixing with the water they use for bathing. These are nothing but Epsom salt prepared specially with certain colors and perfumes. Unfortunately, the same word is also used to denote certain dangerous recreational drugs. It is there fore important that we know and understand the difference between the two. The former is harmless and desirable substance made out of Epsom salt, while the latter are illegal, harmful and undesirable substances coming in the category of drugs!

Incidentally, it is possible now for those in India also to get the harmless and beneficial bath salts of various scents and colors to enhance their bathing experience. [Click this to get bath salts from Amazon!] 


Did you find this information useful?

Please share your opinions.

Tuesday, October 28, 2014

How Do I Overcome My Fears and Greed ? How Could I Lead A Meaningful Life?

Well, first of all let me congratulate you for finding this page. The fact that you found this page in itself is a sign that you have the feeble self recognition that some thing is perhaps not so desirable for you. It is indeed a good thing that you have the urge to transform you for the benefit of you yourself and also for the benefit of others around you.

There are millions and millions of human beings in our modern world now who are just living out their lives without really understanding the real purpose of their lives.

They do not bother to realize the precious purpose of their living in this world. They are just living it out! 

They might say they are living to enjoy life. Their enjoyment is eating and sleeping. And they also work hard to make their eating and sleeping more enjoyable! 

In between they might also do many such other things for gratifying many of their humanly desires and pleasures. 

In this process, all those which they perceive as hindrances to their self gratification become threats for them. Eliminating those threats also becomes a priority in life. They land up in the vicious circle comprising of eating-working-pleasure seeking-threat elimination-self glorification. They get confused with regard to their purpose of life or to do any meaningful thoughts about it! 

What is the purpose? 

Working for eating or eating for working? And what is work for them? Perhaps, they have not thought of it or did not have the time to think of it. Perhaps, they do not bother to think about such a thing. That is because, they know deep within them, that they are leading a purposeless life! They do not want to be caught by the probing of their own inquisitive mind!

They work for getting things for the future and hoarding them because of the deep rooted fear that they might not be able to get the opportunities for having the things that they desire always.

That was the situation when their great forefathers were gatherers wandering in the wilds. Regrettably, modernity has not made any inroads within their minds!

Last week I was watching a TV program which featured a rich man from my own land. He has been successful in making a big fortune by working hard with his business in a foreign land. His earnings are to that extent that he is able to make more and more with it by so many ways. His only thought is making more and enjoying the rest of the time surveying his massive earnings! One of the pastime now for him is to move around in those dozens of apartments that he now owns in the tallest building of the world in the middle east!

He is not alone. There are millions like him. There are also billions who are equally greedy of hoarding the one improvised meal that they just managed to get for the day. Both these kinds of humans are no different from each other!

I do not say that we should not work or eat or enjoy. We need to do all that. 

But why should we be fearful? Why should we be greedy? Why do we hesitate to trust those replicas of our own kind around us?
With Unreasonable Fear Due to Lack of Faith in Others
You Cannot Enjoy This Ride!

Every one around is like that, and so we too. You might argue!

But that is the way the wild animals without much of that thought faculties often do. Even they do not behave like us always. They do not harm their own kind so often as we do!

Take some time to observe them more closely! They are not so greedy. Are they? They are not fearsome about their own kind. Are they? Do they have a better intelligence than us?

Have you ever thought of your inner desire for having some better friendship and fellowship? There are people all around. Yet many of us really lack true friendship and companionship that we desire so much. Yet why do we fail to achieve it?

You understand within your heart that the companionship that you have now is not so reliable. You do not have the trust to trust that for ever. Why is it so? 

All that work that you have done, all that life pleasures that you enjoyed, all that achievements that you had and all the wealth you created are all going to melt away the moment you become weak in holding those. And such a time would likely come in our lives too. And many of us have that fear deep within us. Why?

But is it the way the human life to proceed in this modern era?

Is it the life meant for intelligent humans? 

It is definitely not. I would say. Yes, for all practical purposes, it is like that now. Each and every one of us humans in this world now live as greedy, fearful and purposeless, though perhaps in varying degrees.

But should we continue like that?

What should we do? 

There is a simple way for us to improve this situation.

We need to make some conscious efforts to trust others. But we cannot perhaps do that unless we really trust our unseen creator, our God and our Divine Father. When we learn to trust God fully, we naturally gain the ability to trust our fellow beings, wholeheartedly, justifiably and without errors. Remember, making an erroneous trust could prove to be a disaster in our world now which is full of immature humans. We need to have the righteous divine direction to do things properly!

When we develop the ability to trust our fellow beings wholeheartedly, we acquire the ability to love them selflessly. When more and more of us develop that quality, our world would begin to transform towards overall good.

When we acquire that ability, our fears start vanishing and we start enjoying sharing than hoarding. Our hidden fears would vaporize and we become more and more confident to discard our greed!

Our enjoyments in life get in to a more meaningful level. It is something totally different to experience!

It is possible for me and you. And we surely can achieve it.

Can you imagine the joy of life when we all lead a meaningful life?


Friday, October 24, 2014

Websites You Might Need to Click-in for Your Tours and Travels in India!

Travelling beyond the limits of your local area of residence in India is not an easy task even when you have your own transport means. It needs quite some planning.

On the road by the side of an iron ore mine
on the border of Odissa state and Jharkhand state

That is because of many factors. I had written about some aspects of the present day road travel in many parts of this country in some earlier blogs.

I had also written about the railways, the major public transporter in India owned and operated directly by the government of India.

The air travel is not much different, even after the Indian skies and the Indian airports getting opened up for admitting the several private players.

But such problems would likely remain for the many years ahead as the travel demand in India is always ahead of its supply.

A View from Meghathipur, Jharkhand.
But we should admit the progress that we made in the information technology field. The internet has been a big boon. The dotcom companies and the thousands of their young software engineers have made things easier for the travel and tourism industry and their millions of individual customers. 

They keep helping us to find the best alternatives for getting our travel tickets and the travel options without much hassles. 

Can you locate the snake posing for this photo?

While the railway berth and air line seat reservations have come to us much earlier, the options of getting long distance bus tickets booked online and getting the reliable taxi service online in select cities began only later.

You may have to ask for directions from this one, sometimes!

While all these are improving with time, let me highlight a few of the most reliable of such websites that have become indispensable for our travel planning in India.

1. The IRCTC ( the official ticket reservation company of the Indian railways. This site requires that you sign up first before using their ticket booking facilities. In the recent days, the site has become more user friendly and has improved its response speed. You should require some online banking facility for taking full advantage of this site for railway booking. The site also provides other travel assistance in a limited manner for air line booking, hotel booking and taxi cab booking.

2.  Yatra , Make My Trip, GoIbibo, Cleartrip, are all dependable online private IT enabled companies that provide air ticket booking, price comparisons, railway booking, bus booking, hotel booking, etc. It is better to sign up and register with these sites before you attempt using their facilities. 

3. 90di is a site which would help one to find the best travel options by entering some search query questions in their search box. It has additional facilities to enter the start time of your travel option to find the appropriate bus, train or plane. It would search all the possible data from all the sites listed above and list them out for you to make a more informed choice.

4. PNR Status is a site that helps reserved air and railway travelers in India to check their Passenger Name Record (PNR) status. This will help them to know the actual reservation status, changes in flight or train schedules, etc. The site also gives some important information regarding railway booking, getting PNR status by mobile short message service (SMS) etc. For the Indian railways, this could be done in this Indian Railway Passenger Reservation Enquiry site also.

5. IndiGoAirIndia,  AirAsia, Spicejet, JetAirways, JetKonnectGoAir, etc are the major scheduled arlines in India. Air passengers can book their air tickets through these official websites and also get other important passenger information. Vistara is the newest airline which is about to start its operations in India. There are a few other small scheduled and non-scheduled air line companies also in India.

6. Visiting Andaman Islands could be done through ships. This facility at present is offered only by the Shipping Corporation of India. Details of the ships, the fare, the schedules, etc can be obtained on the web page of the shipping corporation of India. 

7. For those interested in booking houseboats in Kerala backwaters may try My Boat Trip website.

8. redBus is a reliable site that provides long distance bus ticket reservations connecting several Indian cities. The reservations could be done two weeks in advance.

9. India Hotels provides reservation information on hundreds of Indian hotels with tariff, availability, facilities, booking information, etc.

10. Olacabs, UberCarzonrent, Cabs4Hire, Savaari, Cabbooking, BookMyCab, etc are the now active online car rental websites that provide car rental online booking facilities for the major cities of India. There are  several other local level players in many major cities that provide similar services online.

11. Distancesfrom, GoogleMaps, Yahoomaps, etc are the reliable online map service providers which gives the most important geographical and route information for the travelers, especially those who wish to travel by road. Now-a-days, most android cell phones with Geo-positioning service (GPS) facility provide the much needed information for the traveler. Yet, I personally prefer to have hard copy print outs of the detailed route maps while I travel in India. The mobile connectivity and data service facility might ditch you any time while in India, unless you happen to use some direct satellite connectivity!

The Base for Infrastructural Development

In addition to the above there are hundreds of local travel agents with websites operating in most of the major tourist destinations in India. However, it is difficult to ascertain their reliability for sure. Travelers may use their discretion before availing their services.

Wild greenery in a Mining Area!
I would like to request experienced readers to share their real experiences about these sites or other such information useful for all those who wish to travel and explore India.

Wednesday, October 22, 2014

10 Most Intoxicating Effects of Success-toxins in Leaders that might Cause Organizational Accidents!

In the wonder world of professional career, success is a key factor to measure the degree of achievement in life.

Life is deemed as useless when success does not come for a man or a woman in regular intervals of time. Ambitious people are not prepared to let success slip away from them. They would not allow defeat or failures.

Even if they are bed ridden in an intensive care unit, many professionals would not give up their fight to succeed. This is especially true for extremely ambitious professionals like the professional politicians!

Greed to work for money, fame, power, achievement and the like keep over powering their softer mind qualities such as compassion, love, sharing, giving and serving.

Compassion, Love and Sharing Are Like Duty Free Chocolates!

For them, their own self is more important than all others!

Both failure and success have intoxicating effects on them, though they get reflected differently.

Work is their passion, and that passion is the only thing that keep them alive. But work has different meanings in their dictionary!

Success acts as mind toxins for them. This intoxication adversely affects some of their key mind faculties.

When it happens, the effect reflects in them in the following manner:

1. They start believing that what is true for them is universally true.
2. They start believing that what they think is the right thing.
3. They start thinking that their interest is everybody's interest.
4. They start dreaming for greater things beyond their capacities.
5. They start thinking that every other fellow works because of them.
6. They set one standard for them and other for others.
7. They become workaholics with no time for other things.
8. They start losing their patience.
9. They fail to adapt to changing situations.
10.They start justifying all acts, right or wrong, justified for success.

The above ten intoxicating effects soon make the one-time success tasted leader beginning to lose ground sooner or later. Their mind intoxication causes their organizations to go through severe set backs.

But it is possible that the effect of success-toxins could be eliminated.

Would you share your solutions to nullify this problem? 

Jesus Cleansing the Jerusalem Temple: More Details to Learn and Meditate!

 Many of you might have heard or read the incident as given in a few passages in the gospels of the New Testament Bible that describe briefly about the public act of Jesus Christ in which he used some kind of physical force against the money changers and traders inside the Jerusalem temple. 

Is there a need to cleanse your temples now?

Many bible scholars and Christian theologians keep discussing this and giving us their views, versions and scholarly findings about this incident which is now well known as the act of cleansing of the temple.

As the gospel authors wrote about these from what they had learnt in later years, there could naturally be some mismatch here and there about the true nature of the incident, though the intentions of the biblical authors cannot be disputed.

But fortunately, now we have the detailed chronology of events written down for us by a more authoritative group of authors. When I read from this new book, I get the feeling of moving back in history to the times of when this incident really happened. 

According to this new book (my favorite book of life guidance) this incident happened on the Monday, the 3rd April, AD 30. 

For those of you who might be a little inclined to know more, I am reproducing* the relevant passages from this book with a little bit adaptation to render it somewhat simplified:

Early on this Monday morning, Jesus and the apostles assembled at the home of Simon in Bethany, and after a brief conference they started their journey to Jerusalem. The twelve were strangely silent as they journeyed on toward the Jerusalem temple; they had not recovered from the experience of the preceding Sunday when Jesus surprised them by riding the donkey on the streets. They were expectant, fearful, and profoundly affected by a certain feeling of detachment growing out of the Master’s (Jesus’) sudden change of tactics, coupled with his instruction that they were to engage in no public teaching throughout this Passover week.

It was about nine o’clock on this beautiful morning when these men arrived at the temple. They went at once to the large court where Jesus so often taught, and after greeting the believers who were awaiting him, Jesus mounted one of the teaching platforms and began to address the gathering crowd. The apostles withdrew for a short distance and awaited developments.

A huge commercial traffic had grown up in association with the services and ceremonies of the temple worship.


There was the business of providing suitable animals for the various sacrifices. Though it was permissible for a worshiper to provide his own sacrifice, the Jewish religious customs required that this animal must be free from all defects.


This was to be certified by and interpreted by official inspectors of the temple.


Many times worshippers had experienced the humiliation of having their supposedly perfect animal rejected by the temple examiners. It therefore became the more general practice to purchase sacrificial animals at the temple, and although there were several stations on near-by Olivet where they could be bought, it had become the accepted practice to buy these animals directly from the temple’s own animal shelters.


Gradually there had grown up this custom of selling all kinds of sacrificial animals in the temple courts. An extensive business, in which enormous profits were made, had thus been brought into existence. Part of these gains was reserved for the temple treasury, but the larger part went indirectly into the hands of the ruling high-priestly families.


This sale of animals in the temple prospered because, when the worshiper purchased such an animal, although the price might be somewhat high, no more fees had to be paid, and he could be sure about the intended sacrifice not getting rejected on the ground of possessing any blemishes. At one time or another, systems of exorbitant overcharge were practiced upon the common people, especially during the great national feasts. At one time the greedy priests went so far as to demand the equivalent of the value of a week’s labor for a pair of doves which should have been sold to the poor for a few pennies. The kin of the high priests had already begun to establish their bazaars in the temple precincts, those very merchandise marts which persisted to the time of their final overthrow by a mob three years before the destruction of the Jerusalem temple some years later.


But trading in sacrificial animals and sundry merchandise was not the only way in which the courts of the temple were corrupted.


At this time there was fostered an extensive system of banking and commercial exchange which was carried on right within the temple precincts.


And this all came about in the following manner: The Jews coined their own silver money, and it had become the practice to require the temple dues of one-half shekel and all other temple fees to be paid with this Jewish coin.


This regulation necessitated that money-changers be licensed to exchange the many sorts of currency in circulation throughout Palestine and other provinces of the Roman Empire for this orthodox shekel of Jewish coining.


The temple head tax, payable by all except women, slaves, and minors, was one-half shekel, a coin about the size of a ten-cent piece (that existed in the US in the early 1920s) but twice as thick. By the times of Jesus the priests had also been exempted from the payment of temple dues. Accordingly, from the 15th to the 25th of the month preceding the Passover, accredited money-changers erected their booths in the principal cities of Palestine for the purpose of providing the Jewish people with proper money to meet the temple dues after they had reached Jerusalem.


After this ten-day period these money-changers moved on to Jerusalem and proceeded to set up their exchange tables in the courts of the temple. They were permitted to charge the equivalent of from three to four cents commission for the exchange of a coin valued at about ten cents, and in case a coin of larger value was offered for exchange, they were allowed to collect double. Likewise did these temple bankers profit from the exchange of all money intended for the purchase of sacrificial animals and for the payment of vows and the making of offerings.


These temple money-changers not only conducted a regular banking business for profit in the exchange of more than twenty sorts of money which the visiting pilgrims would periodically bring to Jerusalem, but they also engaged in all other kinds of transactions pertaining to the banking business. Both the temple treasury and the temple rulers profited tremendously from these commercial activities. It was not uncommon for the temple treasury to hold upwards of ten million dollars while the common people languished in poverty and continued to pay these unjust levies.


In the midst of this noisy aggregation of money-changers, merchandisers, and cattle sellers, Jesus, on this Monday morning, attempted to teach the gospel of the heavenly kingdom. He was not alone in resenting this profanation of the temple; the common people, especially the Jewish visitors from foreign provinces, also heartily resented this profiteering desecration of their national house of worship.


As Jesus was about to begin his address, two things happened to arrest his attention. At the money table of a near-by exchanger a violent and heated argument had arisen over the alleged overcharging of a Jew from Alexandria.  At the same moment the air was filled by the bellowing of some one hundred bullocks that were being driven from one section of the animal pens to another.


To the amazement of his apostles, standing near at hand, who refrained from participation in what so soon followed, Jesus stepped down from the teaching platform and, going over to the lad who was driving the cattle through the court, took from him his whip of cords and swiftly drove the animals from the temple. But that was not all; he strode majestically before the wondering gaze of the thousands assembled in the temple court to the farthest cattle pen and proceeded to open the gates of every stall and to drive out the imprisoned animals.


By this time the assembled pilgrims were electrified, and with uproarious shouting they moved toward the bazaars and began to overturn the tables of the money-changers. In less than five minutes all commerce had been swept from the temple. By the time the near-by Roman guards had appeared on the scene, all was quiet, and the crowds had become orderly.


Jesus, returning to the speaker’s stand, spoke to the multitude: “You have this day witnessed that which is written in the Scriptures: ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations, but you have made it a den of robbers.’


But before he could utter other words, the great assembly broke out in hosannas of praise, and presently a throng of youths stepped out from the crowd to sing grateful hymns of appreciation that the profane and profiteering merchandisers had been ejected from the sacred temple. By this time certain of the priests had arrived on the scene, and one of them said to Jesus, “Do you not hear what the children of the Levites say?” And the Master replied, “Have not you ever read, ‘Out of the mouths of babies had praise been perfected’?” 


And all the rest of that day while Jesus taught, guards set by the people stood watch at every archway, and they would not permit anyone to carry even an empty vessel across the temple courts.


When the chief priests and the scribes heard about these happenings, they were dumfounded.


All the more they feared the Master, and all the more they determined to destroy him. But they were perplexed. They did not know how to accomplish his death, for they greatly feared the people, who were now so outspoken in their approval of his overthrow of the profane profiteers.


And all this day, a day of quiet and peace in the temple courts, the people heard Jesus’ teaching and literally hung on his words.


This cleansing of the temple discloses the Master’s attitude toward commercializing the practices of religion as well as his disapproval of all forms of unfairness and profiteering at the expense of the poor and the unlearned.

This episode also demonstrates that Jesus did not look with approval upon the refusal to employ force to protect the majority of any given human group against the unfair and enslaving practices of unjust minorities who may be able to entrench themselves behind political, financial, or religious power.

Shrewd, wicked, and designing men are not to be permitted to organize themselves for the exploitation and oppression of those simple kind of good, peace loving people.

My dear reader, did this narrative give you any impetus for learning more? 

[* From Paper-173 of the Urantia Book]

Tuesday, October 21, 2014

When We Fail to Live as Humans...........................!

I have been trying to understand me for quite some time. If I cannot understand my own self, how do I even try to know about all those so called human fellows around me?

But it has not been so easy. More precisely, it has been inconclusive.

What kind of a person I am? Often I think I know me. But soon it so happens that I have to rethink about that conclusion!

What do I want to achieve in this life?

When I do not have the food, the water, and the shelter, what I need to achieve most is to get those first.

When I was a student, I was aiming to complete my studies so that I get in to some earning job that helped me to ensure those essentials of life all throughout my life.

But when I did get the job and the money, my priorities changed.

I wanted to control my subordinates. I wanted to be their god and boss if possible at the same time. I wanted they regard me like that. If they did not, it hurt me. It pinched my ego. I cared the least to recognize that they too had the same kind of mind that I have!

As I began to progress in my career, I became all the more unhappy. Not because I did not have the money and the comforts, but because I was not getting enough people under me to control.

I was not becoming a god like boss! I had bigger gods who dared to control me. I needed independence. Who the hell are all these to rule me, I thought. I am the independent god. Nothing short would make me happy.

Other gods around me soon realized the threat. They soon did all they could to chain me and my ambitions.

Bound from all sides, I became immobilized. But my mind still wandered without any chains!

I began to observe others. Observation became my passion. I began to learn about others. They are all like me. Not much difference. They are all in the same path as me. Some are in the initial stage and some in the later stage. Some are in search of food and some are in search of other things after food.

When they are finished with those all other things they too want to become the gods of others.

When they become a bit successful to be like gods, many of them would like to try and watch their godly powers of destruction, creation and nurturing. 

Chained as I am, I keep watching them in action. I can see me in all of them. It is a wonderful thing. I am watching me in action everywhere!

It is possible for me to see my mistakes in their acts.

It is possible for me to laugh out when they do their foolish acts of fulfilling their humanly egos!

What are they to accomplish in the end? What could I have accomplished by all these?

As I have not been in the act due to the bounding chains, I have not been tired in body and my mind has been with more freedom than they. 

My mind could transcend the present.

It could teach me more things than I ever thought before.

I began to learn about the follies of human life and the misconceptions that me and my human fellows have been keeping in our minds without ever getting the opportunities to discard them.

Is Money Everything in Life?

My mind now could teach me about the differences of my god like thoughts and that of the true nature of God.

It has been a wonderful learning. A never ending learning.

I am happy about it!

Monday, October 20, 2014

Mansion Worlds in the Universe: Do they Really Exist? What Purpose Do they Have?

For those of us who live in the current century having some contemporary knowledge in the advancement of science, it is not difficult to understand the countless numbers of stars , planets and planetary satellites that occupy the vast universe space. All these are said to be clustered in innumerable galaxies. The stellar distances are beyond our human comprehension and are measured in parsecs (3.262 light years) or light years (300000 x 365 x 24 x 3600 kilometers). Our current record of a manned spacecraft's speed is about 40000 km/hr. Such a spacecraft would take about 74 years to cover the distance traveled by light in an year. The nearest star other than our sun is Proxima Centauri which is about 4.24 light years away from us. Even if we travel by the impossible speed of light we would take 4.24 years to reach near that nearest star. Our fastest spacecraft would require 313 years to accomplish that! Incidentally our own sun is at a distance of 149.4 million km from us and its light takes about 8 minutes to reach us.

It is clear then that it would be impossible for us human beings to reach to even to the nearest solar systems in the future due to our age and speed limitations. Our scientists now estimates the diameter of the observable universe something about 93 billion light years. Obviously our current telescopes such as the Hubble space telescope provide us much insight to our scientists about the enormous size of our universe and the enormous numbers of stars and other stellar bodies which our universe contains. Scientists now estimate that there are at least 70 thousand million million million stars in the universe!

Our scientists have now come to a stage that they are finding it difficult to postulate any cohesive theories about the universe now. Things are becoming incomprehensible to their finite and limited intellects.

That is where the revealed cosmology that is given in my favorite book (the Urantia Book) becomes something of relevance. 

I am a student of this revealed knowledge and I keep pondering why such a revelation is provided to mankind in the 20th century? I do find logic and purpose in that.

Now consider the following which my book has revealed to humans way back in the early 20th century when our cosmic science was only in its nascent state. 

It says that there are about 7 trillion planets where intelligent material life exists. They are divided in to seven vast space regions called the super universes, with each super universe holding approximately one trillion material worlds more or less similar to our earth. The invisible author of Paper-15 of the book tells like this:

(Quote) The grand universe number of your world, Urantia, (earth) is 5,342,482,337,666. That is the registry number on Uversa (HQ of super universe number-7) and on Paradise (Centre of all the whole grand universe and the seat of the Universal Father God), your number in the catalogue of the inhabited worlds. I know the physical-sphere registry number, but it is of such an extraordinary size that it is of little practical significance to the mortal mind.Your planet is a member of an enormous cosmos; you belong to a well-nigh infinite family of worlds, but your sphere is just as precisely administered and just as lovingly fostered as if it were the only inhabited world in all existence.(Unquote)

All material in the form of visible matter and energy in the universe is produced from a source of invisible energy of the universe whose source is the Universal Father God. That is the primordial energy and force. There exists living intelligent beings in the primordial energy level and they have been in existence before the material forms came in to existence. Our scientists are wondering about the 96 % of invisible energy in the universe! The rationality of thought of our scientists have to make a paradigm shift if they intent to proceed further! Convergence of spiritual philosophy and scientific philosophy is going to be a reality in the near future due to this.

I have written about these and you can find those in various other articles in this blog site.

Now let me address the topic about what is known as the mansion worlds. 

Many Christians keep wondering about Jesus Christ's parting assurances to his disciples that is given in John 14:1 where he mentions about the many mansions that exist in his Father's (Universal Father God's)  house. 

What are these mansions? The Urantia Book now clarifies it by giving more explanations to this. It says that these are the mansion worlds- the transition training worlds for humans who survive their material death. 

The invisible author of Paper-47 of the book tells us like this: (Quote) The Creator Son (of God), when on Urantia, spoke of the “many mansions in the Father’s universe.” In a certain sense, all fifty-six of the encircling worlds of Jerusem (name given for the divine administration head quarters of the system of mortal inhabited worlds that includes our earth)  are devoted to the transitional culture of ascending mortals (mortal beings whose personalities are prevented from total loss and are provided the chance of immortality and personality progress) , but the seven satellites of world number one are more specifically known as the mansion worlds.

Transition world number one itself is quite exclusively devoted to ascendant activities, being the headquarters of the finaliter corps assigned to Satania (name of the system of worlds that includes earth). This world now serves as the headquarters for more than one hundred thousand companies of finaliters, and there are one thousand glorified beings (mortals who survived earthly death) in each of these groups.

Glorious Earthly Mansions!
What This Could Be in the Mansion Worlds?

When a system is settled in light and life (the pinnacle of material progress), and as the mansion worlds one by one cease to serve as mortal-training stations, they are taken over by the increasing finaliter population which accumulates in these older and more highly perfected systems.

The seven mansion worlds are in charge of the morontia supervisors and the Melchizedeks. There is an acting governor on each world who is directly responsible to the Jerusem rulers. (Unquote)

What we understand from the extensive information in this book is this: 

The mansion worlds are worlds specially made by God's administration for giving an opportunity to mortal beings such as human beings of earth to remove their negative qualities and traits and progress more and more towards divine qualities. These worlds are perhaps several light years away from us and it would not be possible for us to travel to those by our materially invented means of transport.

Death on earth and other similar mortal worlds serves two purposes essentially.

Firstly, it weeds out those who do not have the essential characteristics to gain immortality and divinity.

Secondly, it provides an opportunity for God's administration to de-materialize the screened human personalities and transport them to far away celestial places and again materialize them in bodies that are superior to material forms (such as the morontia form). Thus, all humans with survival characteristics (as judged by the celestial administration) take a kind of re-birth in the distant mansion worlds. There they are taught and trained in all those things which they ought have learnt while on their material existence but failed to do so due to various reasons. The mansion world life make the imperfect human personalities more and more perfect in divine standards and equip them to advance further to higher forms of divinity to reach the presence of the the ultimate power and glory of God.

The Urantia Book authors remind us that while God is love, mercy and justice, the human life is not some thing which is a purposeless accident of the universe. It has a definite purpose determined by the Supreme Intelligence of the Universe. And human beings are not helpless and abandoned orphans who are destined to float aimlessly. All of them have a purpose and they all have responsibilities while they live their short life in their respective material worlds.

When they ignore their respective responsibilities beyond a certain limits they tend to live a life which is characteristically erroneous and evil and they also tend to reject the love of God. Life of such individuals reduces to that of plants and animals which has only local relevance and no future perspective. Their life and life purpose ends when they die.

On the other hand, all those who essentially lead a life fulfilling certain basic characteristics that respect divine love and justice tend to become prospective candidates for immortality and personality survival even after material death. This is true even for those who commit certain circumstantial errors in life, but not repeating those willfully. They are essentially good and pious people who recognize the love of God.

Yet, survival of death to gain immortal personality survival is not so simple and easy for inherently vicious people. No spiritual rituals or beliefs could perhaps change that. For example, the bread and wine ceremony of the churches would not possibly ensure salvation as Christians commonly love to believe. As God sees the human mind, God judges every one according to his or her true standing regardless of their apparent appearance and acts in the society!

We need to give a serious thought to all these!