Immortality of the Soul & Existence of a Spiritual World

Following the death of my mother a few months ago I have been thinking a lot about the nature of our souls, how they communicate, and the age-old question of what happens to the soul (or spirit) after death. This week I read an article by Kevin J. Corcoran, a self-defined Materialist-Christian theologian, who does not believe in the existence of a human soul that could survive the death of the body (A New Way to Be Human – A Christian materialist alternative to the soul). Corcoran wrote of his experience when his father died:

“My father was lying lifeless before me. How could he be with God in heaven? I came to understand that my mother believes what most Christians have believed down through the centuries: humans are immaterial souls capable of disembodied existence. Try as I might, I cannot bring myself to believe what my mother, and most Christians, believe about human nature.

[He concludes] Finally, a materialist view of human nature serves to protect us against turning our longings for a new day into longings for a disembodied existence in some far off and distant heaven.” (http://www.christianitytoday.com/bc/2006/006/16.33.html).

I am delighted that Kevin Corcoran would raise such an important question in mainstream Christian circles. I suspect that he will get a torrent of rebuttals based on ancient Biblical texts. I could join in such a reply based on Scriptures, but I prefer to approach this from a different perspective, since I am not trained as a theologian.

Immortality of the soul is an age-old question that will never finally be put to bed, not until we reach “the other side” beyond death. Two thousand years ago this issue had already divided the Jews (Pharisees vs. Sadducees) at the time of Jesus, and it bedevils us still.

The question of immortality transcends the major faiths. There are many strong traditions all around the world about the survival of the soul (or spirit) after death. I will not even begin trying to review these. For a summary, please see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immortality

I have never dabbled in communication with the dead, or seen ghosts, or had visions of dead people coming back to life. But I have experienced strong intimations of immortality when I encountered the deaths of the people that I loved.

For instance, at the passing of my Uncle Joe (who is worth a story) I felt a profound sense that he had traveled on to Another World. I cannot describe this sensation here except to say that I was so deeply moved at my innermost core that I wrote a eulogistic poem about my uncle’s passing to the world beyond.

This same experience was repeated at the deaths of both my father and mother. When I saw the bodies of my father, and later my mother, lying dead in their coffins, my strong sense was that this was not actually my father or mother, that their indefinable essence had moved on to their Eternal Home, wherever that may be.

My belief in a spiritual world beyond the material also comes from apparent telepathy or “thought transference”. For a mundane example: a few days ago, I was thinking about taking the garbage out to the road for the weekly garbage pickup, when within 60 seconds I received three different messages by phone asking me to see that the garbage was removed before we left our coastal home to return to Vancouver. How could these different people, in different places, without talking with each other, all be thinking about precisely the same topic at the same nanosecond, when five minutes earlier, none of them had been thinking about this mundane subject?

I run into this kind of mental telepathy very often, particularly during communications with my wife or close friends. I think of them and suddenly the phone rings, often to discuss the very topic of my thoughts. This can be explained away as sheer coincidence; but being an old skeptic who has survived harsh wars in the world of business, I wonder if materialist logic is adequate to explain away these mental phenomena? I have experienced thought transference so often that it seems ludicrous for me personally to deny this phenomenon.

Let me tell you another story. My wife and I have made friends with a collection of special people who might be described as handicapped in some way. These people have appeared spontaneously into our lives at various times, so we try to take care of them as best we can. One of these friends was Mel Chang, a man in his 50’s who lived in a Salvation Army residence on the worst block in Vancouver (where more murders occur than anywhere else in this city).

Mel Chang had visited with us often for many years. The last time he shuffled into our house was just before Christmas about 15 years ago; just out of the blue, it occurred to me to ask Mel who we should notify if he ever got sick or died. With some effort, he pulled this information out of a small book and my wife Kathy wrote it down. This incident seemed uneventful at the time.

A month later, our friend Bill Walsh called to say that Mel Chang was in hospital. Then, before we had any chance to visit him in hospital, Mel unexpectedly died. We waited to hear about funeral arrangements, but none were announced. Then we got another call from Bill asking if we knew anything of Mel’s relatives, since the health authorities had tried for several weeks to find his family, but without success. Mel apparently had been adopted, of Chinese and Korean origin, but due to a changed spelling of his name, his family became untraceable. I asked Kathy to look up the information we had recorded on Mel’s last visit to us, which turned out to be the vital missing link. His relatives were then found and so the chapel was full at Mel’s funeral, even though it was held a month late.

What was so utterly strange about this experience was that we had seen Mel hundreds of times before this last visit, but we had never asked him (or any of our other special friends) for this type of contact information; the thought had never even crossed our minds. However, Mel would have been buried anonymously if I hadn’t followed a sudden impulse to get this crucial information.

I cannot explain this away as random chance. I believe that this was an example of spiritual insight supplied from the beyond the human realm, so that Mel could be buried with celebration and dignity.

I believe that the same precise thoughts occur simultaneously to unconnected people all around the globe, beyond materialistic explanation. Trying to rationalize these curious mental phenomena on the basis of global media, or by other materialist explanations, seems very inadequate.

These matters will never be decided by absolute proof. However, I encourage you to consider these questions about the soul in the stillness of you own heart and mind.

I believe that a rich spiritual world is available to all of us. It can not only help to explain our lives, but it can also provide comfort and strength to face sickness, misfortune, death, and other hard realities. I am now happily past my student days when I tried to face the world alone, as a determined materialist-atheist. My life now has purpose, direction and meaning. At age 60, facing both old age and eventual death, this is of great importance!

Anxiety – the Modern Curse?

Getting ready for my 60^th birthday party this week showed me something in myself that is typical of our generation. I get anxious. I think too much about little details. I get slightly irritated with Kathy, who is one of the world’s best wives. I spend money. I eat and drink too much. Nothing is actually wrong, but I create stress for myself and over-react.

Then I start talking with my family and my friends and find that they too are anxious: about business; about family relationships; about life in general.

I go shopping at one of the nicest shopping malls in Vancouver. At first I am overwhelmed at the wonderful atmosphere of Christmas, with wonderful choral music, abundant merchandise, glittering colours, and enticing scents. But the shoppers rush by looking more worried than joyful at this immense banquet of material pleasures. They stop to gamble at the government run lottery. They fret in the long line-ups at the cash registers. They look tired and withdrawn. They too are very anxious.

Our responses to anxiety are often unhealthy. We take drugs, both legal and illegal. We eat and drink too much. We overspend. We worry and plan. Some of us barrage ourselves with loud music, games, and electronic entertainment. Others become depressed or withdrawn. In fact, together with loneliness, anxiety seems to be the curse of our modern world.

Strangely, our anxiety seems mostly unjustified. Our world is richer and safer than in any previous generation. We are living longer. We can travel safely and quickly. Many if not most of the things which worried our parents and grandparents are now better than ever. Yet we worry and stress ourselves and fail to sleep soundly.

There are cures to this anxiety at many levels, although these are intertwined. I would distinguish between the physical, psychological and spiritual aspects of our beings. Curing anxiety successfully takes all three.

I find regular exercise most helpful. A good diet of healthy food is important. Regular routines and intentional forms of relaxation, like music, help a lot. Slowing down to talk with friends and strangers is calming.

What we feed our mind is equally important. Our mental diet is as critical to total health as the food we eat. What do we read, talk and think about? What movies do we see?

Then there is the spiritual dimension. The ancients have always maintained that there is a part of us which transcends the body and the mind which is our spirit. This in turn connects in some mysterious way with the Great Spirit beyond all worlds.

The ancients believed that we must shape our lives in accordance with certain patterns of behaviour which put us in right relationship with the Great Spirit and how the spiritual universe is formed and governed.

When we encounter stresses, setbacks, disappointments and storms in our inner and outer worlds, our spiritual reaction determines how we will come through.

Do we trust God totally, or are we in rebellion against this supreme power? This may seem academic when all is going well, but when intense storms grip us, our spiritual attitudes determine the outcome.

Trusting God completely with our lives and with our future destiny is the ultimate cure for anxiety. No drug or medicine or even healthy living can protect us from life’s ultimate crises, such as: broken relationships; sickness, pain and suffering; career or financial misfortune; getting older; and facing death, whether our own, or the death of those we love.

I will talk more later about the implications of trusting God, because it requires us to reshape our entire lives. But for now, I simply want to affirm that in the storms of my life, however minor (like a party) or major (like facing death), taking care of the body and psyche are both important, but not enough alone. We must also nurture our spiritual being daily to live life well!