© 2012 Steve McIntosh
© 2012 The Urantia Book Fellowship
| Souls on Purpose: The Personal Creed Project | Volume 12, Number 1, 2012 (Summer) — Index | Urantia, 606 of Satania: Concerning the Inhabited Worlds of the Satania System |
The 2012 Summer Study Session will feature Steve McIntosh as keynote speaker. His 2007 book, Integral Consciousness and the Future of Evolution (Paragon House), as well as his forthcoming book, Evolution’s Purpose: An Integral Interpretation of the Scientific Story of Our Origins (Select Books 2012), present a spiritual philosophy of evolution that has many affinities with the teachings of The Urantia Book. The following is an excerpt from Evolution’s Purpose, which will be available August 14, 2012. This excerpt is from the final chapter, entitled “The Promise of a New Evolutionary Worldview.” The chapter as a whole describes the contours of the emerging integral or evolutionary perspective, including how this perspective can be applied for personal growth and political action. This brief excerpt focuses on the spiritual component of this emerging worldview. Please note that the words “traditional,” “modernist,” and “postmodern” are used as defined terms that describe the major population segments that comprise the culture of the developed world.
Any significant advance in cultural evolution will require the emergence of new forms of spirituality. What do I mean by “spirituality”? Our relationship to spirit. And what is “spirit”? Well, to define something is to objectify it, and whatever spirit is, it is certainly not an object. But even though it cannot be adequately defined, this does not mean that spirit is obscure, indefinite, or wholly subjective. Although according to my understanding, spirituality is primarily a matter of direct personal experience, my experience confirms that its referent is real and not simply “in my head.” So what is it? I believe it will take more than this lifetime to truly know. Most of those who have experienced spirit can perhaps agree that it is the presence of the infinite and eternal within the finite universe. Beyond this, however, agreement diminishes as we encounter a spectrum of paths and a wide variety of convictions regarding the nature of spiritual reality.
I briefly mentioned my own personal spiritual convictions in the introduction, and at the end of Chapter 8. This final section, however, will not include a further presentation of my specific version of spirituality. Rather, this section attempts to describe the inclusive agreement which is coming to frame the spiritual component of the emerging evolutionary worldview. It is clear that evolutionary spirituality is not simply a new kind of religion; it encompasses a variety of distinct religious paths (or “spiritual lines of development”) and thus cannot be equated with any particular path or line. In fact, evolutionary spirituality begins with the recognition that religions or spiritual paths are not static institutions, but rather distinct trajectories of ongoing development within consciousness and culture. Although most of these lines are rooted in the traditional stage of psychosocial evolution, the progressive spiritual revival that has arisen with the postmodern worldview demonstrates that the world’s great religions remain vibrant evolving entities. And as we will discuss, the rise of postmodern spirituality serves as a prerequisite for the subsequent emergence of evolutionary spirituality.
Prior to the rise of the postmodern demographic, most forms of spirituality remained within traditional culture. But as the counterculture emerged in the developed world, it brought a renewed appreciation of almost every kind of spirituality. And this revival of interest in spiritual teachings resulted in a kind of countercultural spiritual renaissance which has enriched the lives of millions and which continues to show ongoing vitality here at the beginning of the twenty-first century.
Defining the postmodern spiritual renewal as simply “New Age” would be too narrow. Although what most people would recognize as New Age spirituality certainly comprises a significant part of this movement, alternative spirituality also includes spiritual systems for which the New Age label does not fit, as well as many traditional forms of Eastern spirituality that have been transplanted to the West relatively intact. So, for the purposes of our discussion, I will refer to this eclectic revival of religion within postmodern culture as “progressive spirituality.”
Definitions of this sort are, of course, tricky because within the current culture of progressive spirituality we find religious forms from every level of development. For example, postmodern spiritual culture embraces pre-traditional shamanism, traditional Hinduism, modernist self-help programs, as well as uniquely postmodern forms, such as eco-spirituality. Although practically all the spiritual forms embraced by the cultural agreement of progressive spirituality are postmodern in some sense, the diverse mix of paths that comprises progressive spiritual culture spans the spectrum of development.
From an evolutionary perspective, the postmodern worldview’s quest to transcend the hyper-rational worldview of modernism has sometimes led to excess. For some, this has resulted in confusion and the inability to tell the difference between authentically “trans-rational” spirituality and older forms of “pre-rational” spirituality. As mentioned in Chapter 3, this “pre/trans fallacy” was originally identified by Wilber in the 1970s through his analysis of the work of Carl Jung. However, although the adoption of certain forms of progressive spirituality has led some of those raised within a modernist culture to regress to a traditional level of consciousness, many practitioners of progressive spirituality have nevertheless achieved authentic evolution beyond both the traditional and modernist stages of cultural development.
The evolutionary accomplishments of progressive spirituality in the developed world include the rise of strong cultural mores for religious pluralism, and greater respect for most forms of spirituality. This cultural movement has also led to the large-scale discovery and integration of the wisdom, teachings, and practices of Eastern religions, and esoteric forms of spirituality of all kinds. As a result of the advent of progressive spiritual culture, many people now define spirituality as a personal practice for achieving psychological development and “human potential,” rather than as an inherited ethnic allegiance. Progressive spirituality thus provides a wide variety of choices regarding what it means to be spiritual. This enlarged freedom of choice includes not only which religion to practice, it also supports people in constructing their own eclectic versions of spirituality, mixing and matching disparate forms into a personal spiritual pastiche. Within postmodern spiritual contexts, institutional religious authority has been largely supplanted by the personal authority of each person to decide what they believe and how they will live a spiritual life.
Prior to the rise of progressive spirituality, many Western intellectuals assumed that religion was in an irreversible decline and would soon die out. But the appearance of the now large and vibrant market for alternative forms of spirituality testifies to the ongoing vitality of the religious impulse, and to humanity’s unquenchable thirst for spiritual truth. Thus, just as the first step in understanding the emerging evolutionary worldview as a whole begins with the recognition that the postmodern worldview is authentically more evolved than modernism, understanding evolutionary spirituality likewise begins by appreciating the significant evolution that has been achieved by postmodern spirituality in the last fifty years.
However, evolutionary spirituality—which might be termed “post-postmodern spirituality”—attempts to model the evolutionary technique of growth through transcendence and inclusion. Evolutionary spirituality thus seeks to build on the accomplishments of progressive spirituality, while simultaneously transcending its immaturities and debilitating pathologies. The shortcomings of progressive spirituality include the already mentioned “pre/trans fallacy” of magical thinking, “soft-headedness,” superficiality, commercialism, and spiritual materialism. Despite its accomplishments, progressive spirituality has also promoted an extensive amount of pseudoscience, co-opting and distorting science to prop up questionable belief systems. Further, it has contributed to a culture of narcissism and selfishness, promoting the idea that reality is simply whatever one wants it to be. And progressive spiritual culture has also given rise to a wide variety of insular cults that isolate and control members to their significant detriment.
Although these problems are not unique to postmodern spirituality, they stand out in greater relief and are in many ways made worse because of their association with postmodernism’s otherwise commendable evolutionary accomplishments. In other words, because postmodernism is generally the most evolved form of large-scale culture to appear in the timeline of human history, its spiritual pathologies have been magnified and its shortcomings rendered more difficult to overlook. An important task of evolutionary spirituality is thus to prune away the New Age sins of progressive spirituality and thereby produce a new form of spiritual culture that can provide more powerful forms of unifying leadership for our society.
In fact, progressive spirituality itself began with a similar round of cultural pruning. Arising as a significant demographic in the 1970s, and coming to full fruition in the 1990s, progressive spirituality’s cultural agreement effectively expelled all forms of belief system exclusivity and claims for only “one true way.” It banished teachings of fear, hell, and wrathful deities, and it did away with most forms of dogmatic literalism. Despite its welcoming pluralism and intensive relativism, progressive spirituality did achieve progress by purging some of the falsehoods propagated by earlier forms of religious culture.
Now as evolutionary spirituality continues with the next steps of this process of clarifying and purifying our understanding of spirit, it attempts another round of pruning. Evolutionary spirituality rejects claims that nature and history are a meaningless illusion or a pointless accident, that progress in civilization does not matter, or that everything is already perfect just as it is. Additionally, it rejects the idea that humans are no more valuable or evolved than other forms of life; it discards teachings that reality can be entirely created according to our wants or whims; it denies the notion that thinking and philosophy have no value in the spiritual quest, or that spiritual teachings have no obligation to be consistent with scientific facts; and it questions the claim that all spiritual paths are equally valid. Although evolutionary spirituality can recognize truth in paradox, and can see degrees of truth even in what it rejects, it nevertheless pushes off against the limitations of progressive spirituality in its quest to make a dialectical advance into the next era of humanity’s spiritual evolution. Yet evolutionary spirituality does not distinguish itself from progressive spirituality by attempting to nullify or vilify this previous level of development. In our use of the dialectical evolutionary technique we must be careful to include the important aspects of what we are otherwise attempting to transcend. And of course, this dialectical technique applies to earlier levels of development as well. Thus, an important element of evolutionary spirituality is its attempt to reintegrate at a higher level the rigor and clarity of truth provided by modernist science and philosophy.
Evolutionary spirituality is primarily forward looking, so it can be understood more by what it affirms than by what it denies. Although the “spiritual teachings” of evolution are not a fixed doctrine—although our understanding of evolution’s spiritual message is itself evolving and always subject to a variety of interpretations—most evolutionaries will agree that evolutionary spirituality affirms a universe of progress and purpose; that it acknowledges the essential interconnectedness and interdependence of all beings while simultaneously affirming the unique originality of every individual; that it recognizes a universal form of spirituality in our evolving conceptions of beauty, truth, and goodness; and that it confirms the freedom of human will and the open-ended potential of our ongoing spiritual growth. Evolutionary spirituality also sees most forms of spirituality as evolving lines of development that will inevitably continue to grow beyond the historically situated evolutionary worldview itself.
Further, evolutionary spirituality recognizes that religion fulfills an essential and ongoing function in cultural evolution by providing explanations and practices that go beyond science or philosophy. Most forms of evolutionary spirituality thus transcend science and philosophy by describing the essential nature of the self, by explaining the character of the ultimate or absolute, by providing hope in some kind of an afterlife, and by offering practices through which these realities can be at least partially experienced. Even though the different lines of religious development that are welcomed within evolutionary spirituality’s cultural agreement often offer conflicting explanations of these things, faith in some form of higher truth cannot be dispensed with if one is to live an authentic spiritual life. That is, at a very minimum, all forms of genuine spirituality require that we ultimately recognize something larger than ourselves.
As I have argued, the newly emerging picture of evolution now being disclosed by science and philosophy—the great story of cosmological, biological, and psychosocial evolution—presents a spiritual teaching. Although it has many facets, the essence of this teaching is that evolution is moving toward ever-greater realizations of beauty, truth, and goodness. And it is this growing recognition of evolution’s spiritual message that serves as a foundation for evolutionary spirituality. Yet the best view of evolution’s spiritual truth regards it not as a substitute for existing forms of religion, but rather as a supplement that can enhance almost every kind of spirituality. In fact, the spiritual teachings of evolution confirm much of what existing religions have been teaching all along.
For example, our discussion in Chapter 6 showed how evolution generates value in opposing yet complementary directions—increasing the intrinsic value of its emerging new wholes while simultaneously adding to the instrumental value of its encompassed parts. And an understanding of this method of evolutionary development helps us better appreciate how the spiritual development of our individual character—the growth of our personal intrinsic value—is linked to the instrumental service value that we provide to others. Stated differently, when we see how evolution grows in value overall, this teaches us that the gifts we give to the world actually provide the rungs of the ladder of our own ascent, and that our individual spiritual status can be partially measured by our usefulness in giving value to our fellows. This newly recognized truth about evolution thus confirms an ancient religious teaching. As Jesus said, “By their fruits you shall know them.”
As the evolutionary worldview develops as a new form of culture, its enlarged understanding of the spiritual nature of evolution will become a touchstone that uplifts all the various forms of spirituality it encompasses. The spiritual lessons of evolution will thus serve as a “true tone” or “concert pitch” that can help “tune up” all the spiritual lines of development that will come to “play in the orchestra” of emerging evolutionary spiritual culture.
And as the evolutionary perspective endeavors to discern the spiritual teachings of evolution, it attempts to learn from all the myriad forms of beauty, truth, and goodness that can be found within the evolutionary epic. But among the many spiritual lessons of evolution, the truths of the evolutionary impulse are among the most important. As we also discussed in chapter 7, the internal spectrum of desire that spans the range from our most basic biological urges to our most sublime spiritual aspirations, provides a personal microcosmic experience of the creative unfolding of the universe as a whole—from matter, to life, to mind, to spirit. We can thus each connect to evolution’s macrocosmic purpose through the personal purpose that courses within our own minds and hearts. By working to feel and cultivate this impulse as a spiritual practice, we find that the pull of value gravity becomes intensified, and our ability to give our gifts to the world becomes ever stronger. And it is through this practice of working with the evolutionary impulse that we become increasingly assured that we are spiritual beings living in a universe of ongoing spiritual growth.
Steve Mcintosh is a well-known author in the emerging integral philosophy movement and a life-long student of progressive spirituality. He is a graduate of the University of Virginia Law School and the University of Southern California Business School, and since 1995 he has served as founder and president of the Boulder-based consumer products company Now & Zen, Inc. He is also an original member of the “Evolutionary Leaders” group spearheaded by Deepak Chopra. For more on his work, visit: www.stevemcintosh.com
| Souls on Purpose: The Personal Creed Project | Volume 12, Number 1, 2012 (Summer) — Index | Urantia, 606 of Satania: Concerning the Inhabited Worlds of the Satania System |