Natepod The weblog of Nate Cull

Review: The New Dispensation

The New Dispensation, As Presented by THE SPIRIT WORLD Through the Automatic Writings of FRANCES BIRD

Sometimes I have to pinch myself to remind that I am actually awake.

I have been collecting a small pile of 'interesting' spiritual books in the last couple of years, which are fitting together in a rather startling way. This is one of them. (I'm now reading a 2002 book by Mary - yes, the Mary, as far as I can tell, or at least a very similar Mary to the Mary of Medjugorje - which is even more exciting, but I'll write that one up when I'm done).

Frances Bird is a lady I have been able to find little about on the Internet, which in itself is surprising. There seem to be a set of four fairly large books written by her, of which The New Dispensation is one; I found it in the New Age section of a local second-hand bookstore. This edition is 'Copyright 1988 by LC Publishing Company, California', but the actual text has to date to the World War I era, so I am confused as to why there's not an out-of-copyright edition up on Gutenberg somewhere. There is an 'Editor's Note' from Walter F Prince from the American Society for Psychical Research claiming that the ASPR was very impressed and had requested a copy for their archives.

The book has a curiously old-fashioned, scholarly tone to it, which can make it somewhat dense reading, but it's divided into short essay-like chapters. The general theme is 'the end of the age', and gives what appears to be an overview of a time of increasing change on Earth, starting from World War I. There are a number of theological threads which really need more in-depth examination, but what struck me most is the deep parallels between this, a 'channeled' book, and the Pentecostal 'prophecy' The Harvest.

What keeps being repeated is that this era is a time of transition, a time of increasing personal freedom and individual ethical choice/responsibility, and of increasing connection between the physical and spiritual worlds. As well, the idea that wars and natural disasters are not 'sent from God' so much as created by human intention; that 'everything grows from seeds' and that what happens 'legally' is allowed to exist; but that 'what is visible is ended' in the sense that creative power only happens in the invisible, interpersonal realm of mind; when a war happens, it is because a large number of people have decided to have a war; but at the same time, the physical manifestation of that war is also the end of the matter - the devastation being revealed brings us a chance to change our ideas and decide not to do that in future. This follows on from the idea that we should forgive and hold our pasts lightly because nothing in the physical world 'really exists' in the same sense that mental intentions do; the present is already history, and we do not have to be tied to our history, at every moment we have a chance to 'decide again' and change our plans.

There's a lot more, and I feel like I'm babbling a bit, because putting all this stuff into simple words is difficult, even though the ideas feel enormously simple. Basically what I am looking at here is the sort of 'unified God theory' I have been searching for for years; a map and outline of the spiritual territories describing how things fit together and what the purpose of life on Earth is. It turns out that the common understanding of the Christian gospel is, by and large, correct, but there are a few mistakes that have been picked up by various sects over the years which aren't necessarily helpful; the important issues are love, mercy, kindness and forgiveness rather than religious observance as such; the 'dead' really do watch and interact with the 'living' on Earth, and the whole spectrum of saints/angels watching over us is literally true; while the Christians are right about Jesus being 'the Saviour' (though we don't yet really understand even that bit), God looks at our hearts and is more interested in our attitudes to other people, so it's not about religion per se but about love; the Eastern concepts of 'karma' and 'maya' are also pretty much on the ball, but karma can be shifted (which is where prayer for others, and especially prayer for our enemies, comes in); there is One God, so yay for the montheists, and in some sense that is hard to articulate He is both separate from us *and* a part of us (and we are a part of Him); but there also are a whole lot of saints/ancestors/angels, so yay sort of for the polytheists/pagans; reincarnation in some sense may be true, though again whatever happens there is difficult to map onto existing physical ideas; the spiritual universe is composed of intentionality rather than matter, so time and space are fluid where saints are concerned; the purpose of life is to grow and develop our spiritual capacities, of which love/compassion/kindness is the key; even in Heaven there is regret if we fail to accomplish our personal 'mission' in life; everyone is going to be saved eventually, but there does exist a Hell-like place, which is created by our dark impulses, and you really don't want to spend any time there, so all the stuff about 'saving souls from Hell' is also literally true; 'eternal damnation' is only as eternal as we want it to be; you can repent or grow spiritually after death but it's a lot slower than doing it on Earth; everyone is here because they chose to be, literally, and we also choose our experiences; all suffering is karma (caused by human choice) but not necessarily by our choice; we may have chosen to endure someone else's pain in order to become more compassionate; the glib Evangelical Christian slogan of 'God has a wonderful plan for your life' is in fact literally true; basically relax, we are all living in The Matrix, but it's not run by evil machines but by a loving Father.

Oh yes, and a whole planet-load of trouble is heading our way (like we didn't already know that) - but some of it can be averted if we have compassionate intentions and actions, and what remains is an opportunity to learn new skills and basically buff our stats and level-up.