The Tao of Christ

The political climate in America is getting crazy. A survey released this week by LifeWay Research reported that half of all pastors report having heard people in their congregations repeat conspiracy theories.  I recently read an article in which a woman said that she believes that Trump won the 2020 election with the same certainty that she believes in God. I am sure she is said that to bolster the credibility of her conspiracy theory. But when people hear it, all it does is put faith in God on the same level as a conspiracy theory. No wonder so many people are skeptical of organized religion! Conspiracy theories have been around for quite a while, but they seem to have gotten worse in the last few years.  It is only in the last few years that I have started hearing phrases like fake news and alternative facts. A recent article in the evangelical magazine Christianity Today says that evangelicals disproportionately believe in conspiracy theories, especially QAnon. What does that say about evangelical Christianity?One thing these last few years has taught me is how easily people are fooled … including us. Our brains are not a reliable as we think they are. How easy it is for the human mind to believe almost anything. When we enter into the world of religion and spirituality, there are no holds barred in this self-deception. In this episode we look at the presence of conspiracy theories in religion and spirituality, including nonduality, and what is means to awaken from all conspiracy theories.  View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

Life is suffering. That is the first noble truth of the Buddha and the first sentence of psychiatrist Scott Peck’s classic book The Road Less Traveled. He phrased it as “Life is difficult.” Much of the suffering and difficulty in life comes from interpersonal relationships. They disturb our peace of mind and keep us awake at night. What hurts the most is when personal relationships with people we care about - friends and family - are damaged. At such times we look to spirituality for how to understand and address our feelings and thoughts. What does nonduality have to say to this? That is what I talk about in this episode.View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

In this episode I point to our true nature and the nature of Reality. This cannot be done directly so I will use a metaphor. One of the best is the traditional Zen koan about seeing our original face before we were born. I am going to do a variation on this by asking you to look at both what you were before birth and what you will be after death. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

In this episode we come to the final chapter of the Gospel of John, which I have been interpreting as a proclamation of the gospel of nonduality. In this chapter we explore how the gospel of nonduality had to struggle with dualistic gospel in the early centuries of the church. This involved a struggle for leadership in the church after the death of the apostle John. We look at the role of Mary Magdalene and women leaders in early nondual Christianity, as well as the nondual Gnostic texts of the Nag Hammadi library. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

Easter is a proclamation of Christian nonduality. This is seen in two of the most famous Easter stories, which are found in the 20th chapter of the Gospel of John. One is the familiar story of Mary Magdalene coming to the tomb of Jesus on Easter morning. The other is the equally famous story of Doubting Thomas. John’s presentation of the giving of the Holy Spirit – John’s Pentecost – is also examined as part of the Easter Sunday. It is placed on Easter to communicate the truth that the risen Christ shares his spirit, his essential nature with us. This empowerment is called Holy Spirit. It can also be called Self-Realization or Christ Consciousness. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

The symbol of the Christianity is the cross. It is also a powerful symbol of nonduality. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

The arrest and trial of Jesus in the Gospel of John is interpreted as the proclamation of the nondual identity of Jesus and his message. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

In the 17th chapter of the Gospel of John we have one of the best descriptions of nonduality in the Bible. It comes in a prayer Jesus offered on the night he was arrested. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

This episode is an interview that former evangelical pastor and current church planter Luke Bricker did with me for his podcast entitled The Spiritual Nomad. His podcast can be found at TheSpiritualNomad.org. I share quite a bit of autobiographical information in this interview, including accounts of three times in forty years that nondual awareness enveloped me. These were primarily a loss of a sense of individual existence, but also oneness with all that is. The third time in 2012 was an abiding Presence that has not left, but has deepened and unfolded in the last eight years. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

The further we get into the Gospel of John, the closer we come to the core of the John’s gospel of nonduality. The structure of the gospel up to this point has been seven I AM sayings of Jesus, accompanied by seven teachings that Jesus gave. In the 15th chapter we have the last of these sayings. He says here, “I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser.” Then a couple of verses later he says, “I am the vine, you are the branches.” In fleshing out this metaphor Jesus talks a lot about “abiding.” Some translations use the word remain or dwell, but I like the word “abide” because it means to make one’s home in, as in the word abode. It means to live in. Jesus says, “Abide in Me, and I in you.” This is my awareness of Christ. I abide I Christ and Christ in me. There is an oft- repeated evangelical mantra: “It is not about religion. It is about relationship – a relationship with Jesus Christ.” When I hear that I respond, “It is not about religion or relationship. It is about reality.” There is more to spirituality than relationship with God understood as a divine person. There is the Reality of the universe that is nondual. It is not about religion or relationship; it is about identity – identity with God where there is no longer two. As Jesus said, “I and the Father are one.” This is a quantum leap beyond relational Christianity. I know because I have experienced both. What I am talking about here is union with God or “abiding in Christ.”A dualistic relationship with Christ is nothing compared to being one with Jesus Christ. In Christ we are one with God and with all of creation. In this union there is no distinction between us and not us. In unitive awareness the individual self that appears to be in relationship with God ceases to exist. The self dissolves. It is seen through as a psychological fiction, which means that its relationships are fiction.Instead there is only one, which can be called Reality but there is really no good name for this. I use the word God, but it is not the theistic concept of God. Meister Eckhart calls this the God beyond God or the Godhead. It includes the personal God, but is beyond God to the same degree that an idol made of stone is beyond the theistic God. Paul Tillich calls this Being Itself or the Ground of Being. This is what we really yearn for when we desire a closer relationship with God. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU