ACTIVE LIFE AFTER DEATH, OR LONELINESS CONTENTS

TO THE READER – AN INDISPENSABLE LINK BETWEEN PAST AND PRESENT

THE BIRTH OF THE BOOK “ACTIVE LIFE AFTER DEATH, OR LONELINESS”

WHAT IS A “MEDIUM”?

THE STRANGE ACQUAINTANCE WITH THE STORY OF MRS. A.B.

IN THE GRIEF OVER THE LOSS OF A BELOVED PERSON – GREAT, SUCCESSFUL OR UNLUCKY – ALL ARE EQUAL. THE STORY OF DR. REZOVA

WHAT HAPPENS TO THE SOULS OF PEOPLE, WHOSE EARTHLY LIFE WAS DEDICATED TO SCIENCE

WHY SHOULD MANKIND DEVELOP SCIENTIFIC THINKING?

SUFFERING AND PAIN ON THE EARTH ARE THE RESULT OF COMPLEX SPIRITUAL INTERRELATIONS AND PROCESSES DUE TO THE GROWING MATERIALISM OF MANKIND. THE TRAGEDY OF LOSING UNEXPECTEDLY YOUR OWN CHILD.

SOMETHING ONE HAS TO KNOW ABOUT THE PEOPLE DYING YOUNG

LONELINESS AFTER DEATH

WE CHOOSE OUR OWN PARENTS BEFORE OUR INCARNATION ON THE EARTH AND WE SHOULD ACCEPT THEM THE WAY THEY ARE. ON THE PATH OF OUR LIFE, HOWEVER, WE HAVE THE CHOICE OF SELECTING OUR FRIENDS.

CONFLICTING DIFFERENCES OF CONSCIOUSNESS – A CONVERSATION WITH MY FRIEND NATALIA

LET US ACCEPT THE DIFFERENT OUTLOOK AND WORLDVIEW OF OUR RELATIVES WITH UNDERSTANDING AND LOVE

AN APPEAL TO THE READER FOR ATTENTION TO AND COMPREHENSION OF WHY THE SPIRITUAL WORLDS WITHDREW THEIR INTIMACY AND VISIBILITY FOR MANKIND

LONELINESS AFTER DEATH DEPENDS ON OUR LIFEWAYS ON THE EARTH

THE MENTAL RELIGIOUS ADJUSTMENT DURING OUR EARTHLY LIFE DETERMINES THE RESPECTIVE GROUP, IN WHICH WE WILL FIND OURSELVES AT A CERTAIN STAGE OF OUR LIFE AFTER DEATH

WHILE ON THE EARTH, WE HAVE TO BE SOCIABLE AND CARING, TO CREATE AND CHERISH OUR FRIENDSHIPS AND CONNECTIONS

THE “DOCTOR’S” STORY

SUICIDE IS FLIGHT FROM RESPONSIBILITY FOR WHAT WE HAD PLANNED FOR OURSELVES BEFORE COMING FOR A NEW LIFE

DISSATISFACTION WITH LIFE SHOULD NOT LEAD TO SUICIDE. DISSATISFACTION SHOWS WEAKNESS AND IMPERFECTION OF PERSONALITY.

PEOPLE SUSCEPTIBLE TO SUICIDE SHOW EARLY SYMPTOMS OR SIGNS OF THEIR INTENTIONS. THEY CAN BE HELPED IN MANY WAYS, BUT WE NEED TO HAVE A SHARP EYE, BE WELL-MEANING AND LOVING

UNSPOKEN THINGS MAY LEAD TO SUICIDE

ABSTRACT THINKING AND THE VIGOROUSLY GROWING MATERIALISM RAISED A WALL BETWEEN THE PEOPLE LIVING ON THE EARTH AND THOSE LIVING IN THE SPIRITUAL WORLD. ON THE ESTABLISHING OF A CONNECTION BETWEEN THE LIVING AND THE DEAD.

SPIRITUAL INVESTIGATIONS SHOW THAT WE ARE ALL IN PERMANENT EXCHANGE WITH THE DEAD

WE MEET OUR DEAD AT THE MOMENT OF GOING TO SLEEP AND AGAIN AT THE MOMENT OF WAKING UP, BUT THE REMEMBRANCE OF THIS REMAINS IN THE SUBCONSCIOUS

SPIRITUAL REPERCUSSIONS AND CONSEQUENCES FROM HATRED

READING FOR THE DEAD

RESTORING THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE LIVING AND THE DEAD

A DIALOGUE WITH THE READER

WHICH IS THE LEAST UNDERSTOOD THING? – SUFFERING
WHICH IS THE MOST PURIFYING THING? – PAIN
“SEARCH FOR THE TRUTH, FOR IT WILL MAKE YOU FREE”, SAID CHRIST

POSSIBILITY TO MANIPULATE CONSCIOUSNESS WITH THE VAGUE CONCEPT ‘EXTRATERRESTRIAL”

THE WORK OF THE ANGELS IN THE ASTRAL BODY OF MAN

WHO WOULD BENEFIT MOST FROM A “SLEEPING” MANKIND?

SOME RECOMMENDATIONS AND PRAYERS

THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES, TAKING CARE FROM THE VERY BEGINNING FOR MANKIND’S DEVELOPMENT AND EVOLUTION

HELP IN A CRITICAL SITUATION. WAS IT PERHAPS AN ANGEL?

IT PASSES BELIEF

LET US NOT BE PREJUDICED – IT IS NEVER TOO LATE TO CHANGE OUR OUTLOOK AND WORLDVIEW

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CORRECTLY UNDERSTANDING THE DEED OF CHRIST

THE IDEA OF CHRIST AND OUR CONNECTION WITH HIM

WHY WE NEED TODAY TO FILL OURSELVES MORE AND MORE WITH THE CORRECT UNDERSTANDING OF WHAT EXACTLY WAS GIVEN TO MAN BY CHRIST. WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THE EXPRESSION “THE MYSTERY OF GOLGOTHA”

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ACCEPTING A PIECE OF WISDOM WITHOUT ITS PERMEATION BY CHRIST AND ACCEPTING IT ILLUMINATED BY THE LIGHT OF CHRIST

WHAT DOES IMMORTALITY ACTUALLY MEAN

INCORRECTLY AIMED CURIOSITY

ONLY CHRIST IS CAPABLE OF REDEEMING OUR DEBTS, TAKING THEM UPON HIMSELF

LET US NOT UNDERESTIMATE, BUT GET TO KNOW OUR ENEMY AND HIS METHODS

CONCLUSION

TO THE READER

REFERENCES

LET US LIVE WITHOUT FEAR
To Liana

Let us live without fear
God is in us
And our souls know
That death
Means to embrace infinity,
That beyond this horizon
Follows another horizon.
Our mission here is clear –
The invincible life
Is not piling up,
But throwing out the ballast,
Until we take off and fly.

LONELINESS AFTER DEATH

What the followers of Spiritual Science refer to as LONELINESS AFTER DEATH is a subject, which may be of interest to everybody, but can be correctly understood only by people having at least some level of self-knowledge. The questions asked by my readers are much simpler and maybe this is the reason why it never came to my mind to write on this subject. My fateful path wished to challenge me only two or three months ago by offering me two shocking meetings with people most dear and near to me, who motivated me to tackle the subject of loneliness after death. The prospective path of rightful evolution of a very large part of mankind is endangered through their ignorance, lack of interest and generally passive attitude towards the spiritual aspect of earthly life. I decided that it was only proper to tell these two stories, because they could serve not only as illustration of something, which any reader can find in his or her personal surroundings, but also facilitate the understanding of the subject-matter.

WE CHOOSE OUR OWN PARENTS BEFORE OUR INCARNATION ON THE EARTH AND WE SHOULD ACCEPT THEM THE WAY THEY ARE. ON THE PATH OF OUR LIFE, HOWEVER, WE HAVE THE CHOICE OF SELECTING OUR FRIENDS.

The category of my readers was gradually formed during the years through my books. In a few words, I receive now more and more letters by people with spiritual pursuits and needs, or by people asking advice and guidance what to read. Fewer and fewer are the people asking me about a medium. Among the people with whom I communicate on everyday basis and even among those who contact me for advice or help, I am not called upon to meet materialists of the most extreme type. To be more exact, I should say I am not always called upon to meet them. Some of my closest and most beloved friends from the past, however, and even some relatives, are a mirror image of this type – entirely materialistic, feeling not only reluctance but even something akin to aversion to talk about spiritual issues or pursuits. In the past, almost all my professional and friendly surroundings included extreme materialists. They ridiculed my astrological and esoteric studies and were even resentful. Most of them are already deceased.

As a conscientious disciple of Spiritual Science, I am doing my best to be free from prejudices, to be open to any information and any kind of human thinking, not to be critical, to accept and love my family and friends the way they are. I am doing my best, but it is not easy and I am not always successful. Here is my story in this connection.

CONFLICTING DIFFERENCES OF CONSCIOUSNESS – A CONVERSATION WITH MY FRIEND NATALIA

We have been friends with Natalia for more than forty years. She married quite young to an Englishman and moved to live in England. It has been practically always clear to me that she was karmically predestined to live there, because she had studied in an American college in Bulgaria, but her desires were connected only with England. We managed to maintain our friendship all these years across the borders by writing and warded off a number of attempts and intrigues from friends and relatives, aiming to cause a quarrel between us. Natalia (her pet name is Netty) was familiar with all the vicissitudes and struggles in my difficult career and life in the West, at the time when I still had a Bulgarian passport and had to endure all restrictions ensuing from my moral choice to stay Bulgarian. She, on her part, also put up a courageous struggle on her path of life, succeeding to create stability and material security, and she even settled nicely the life of her son by taking him with her in England in the years, when it was most difficult to leave Bulgaria.

For the last five or six years, she comes to stay in Bulgaria for one or a couple of months each summer and enthusiastically busies herself meeting all her relatives and friends from the past. Naturally, I also met her once or twice during these visits. Even at the time of our first reunion after a long separation of at least 15 years, although we chatted for hours on end about memories and experiences from our younger days, I realized that there was an unbridgeable abyss between us, created as result of differences in our worldviews. She expressed with aplomb and vehemence her amazement at how I could drop such a successful and creative artistic career, exchanging it for… well… “all sorts of strange, occult ‘nonsense’”. I gave her as a gift each of my newly published books and she openly confessed that she herself would hardly ever read “such stuff”, but her Bulgarian friends in England were keenly interested – they would certainly read them. So, during our first meeting, unexpectedly for both of us, we crossed the swords of our minds and in two or three positions only we realized that we were standing at an immeasurable distance from each other in terms of ideas and worldviews. We took the prudent decision never to argue about such issues – religion, evolution, materialism, spirituality, spiritual sciences, esoteric development and so on, in order not to spoil our friendship. The time we spent together was so short and it would be a pity to destroy what we had managed to protect for nearly half a century on account of the differences in our worldview. Once taking this decision, we have always kept to it.

Each year, when she came to Bulgaria, she invited me to visit her home in England, emphasizing that all her friends from Bulgaria had already visited her, some of them even twice, and I was the only one who could not find the time to do it. She mentioned that she had a look at each of my new books, but apart from the unfaltering high estimation of my intellect, she could not get it how I found these inspirations to write about “such stuff”! She confessed though, that her friends were “mad” about reading them and admired them and then she went into great detail to expound her entirely materialistic outlook.

“See here, Liana, you have to understand me”, she started with a sincere wish to explain her attitude. “I have achieved everything I wanted in this life. Maybe it does not amount to much, but I have my own home, a house to be more correct, I have friends, my son is with me and he has wonderful family and children… I meet friends and we play cards together, I throw parties, watch TV and grow flowers in the garden… I think I have all I need. In a few words – I am content. I am content with my life and I enjoy it the way it is”.

What could I say to this! I understood her and at that particular moment I was aware that it was her human right of choice and freedom. At the same time I knew that my eventual visit as a guest would give rise to a problem of communication and besides, I did not have time for such long meetings.

That summer Natalia came to Bulgaria again and we met first at her home, her maiden home. We exchanged the usual first impressions, questions about close friends, had a look at the latest photos of her grandchildren and her home, and then decided to have an evening meal together. We chose a restaurant close by, with a nice garden as the weather was nice too. While we were having our dinner, the conversation kept returning to the fact that both of us had the same medications for treatment of the bone system, but Netty said she paid nothing for them, while I paid 60-80 leva each month for one of the medications only.

“Does this privilege concern only certain medications?” I asked her puzzled.

“No. Practically all medications for people aged over 60 in England are free”.

“And what do you pay for examinations and tests?”

“All kinds of tests, once you have reference from your GP for a certain specialist or a hospital cost nothing. All medical services are free – the health insurance fund pays for them.”

“I can’t believe it! It seems in England is even better than in Sweden. Well, how is it with operations?”

“Operations are also free, but we have to wait a month or a month and a half, while they find a place to fit you in.”

At that moment I begged her to contact several Bulgarian television programmes, which were treating at that time the shocking issue of the lack of medications for cancer patients, diabetic patients and other life saving drugs even at very high prices, and to tell our TV audience about the health insurance fund in England. Natalia, however, firmly refused.

At that point, the TV, which was broadcasting a football match, faded down because of the coming news and we could talk again without having to compete in shouting.

“Still, Liana, I don’t understand why you are staying to live in Bulgaria. I am also Bulgarian and it hurts me to see the problems and the whole mess in Bulgaria. I am happy to see my friends, when I come back, I love my country, but I cannot not stay and live here. How are you managing to do it?”

“You, as many other Bulgarians, too, won’t understand it”, I answered bored with this question. “It is as simple as this – there is a lot of spiritual life in Bulgaria, if you are striving to find it. I have a circle of spiritual adherents, something not that easy to find when I’m abroad. In western countries the material culture has atrophied or rather has pushed the spiritual needs and interests in the back.”

“Yes, but people here live under the existence minimum…”

“It is true”, I agreed promptly, “but there are certain compensations, for which you need to open up yourself, if you are to understand them – the climate, the sun, the nature in Bulgaria, the food is different, and so are the people. The people, because they have suffered a lot, are more warm-hearted, they respond more kindly to individual or common distress, to disasters… They are more social in general. Bulgarians have another spiritual make-up – such as you would encounter only in countries, which have also been through long suffering and hell.”

“But people here are very simple, or they would not have allowed such poor situation in Bulgaria.”

“Oh, this exactly, is quite another subject and I don’t feel like talking about it” - replied immediately. “I met nowhere in the world such abundant and interesting intelligentsia as there is in Bulgaria, and I am saying this from my personal experience. Ignorance can be seen everywhere, but responsible for the poverty here are our governors, all the governments in which the people have set so many hopes ever since 1989… On the other hand, Bulgaria has a great history, great nature,sacred national places and… some “delicate” things, which, if you want to feel them, you should be here. Or, as master Peter Dunov said, ‘The Spirit works well in Bulgaria’”.

“Ah, see here, I will not tolerate religious subjects!” waved her hand Netty with a weary expression.

“Take it easy, I have no such intention – we agreed on it, right?” – protected I myself, “I only want to tell you that Bulgarians read a lot, they are eager to learn, they look for information in a wide aspect, ask questions, have broad interests in general, but so many Bulgarians are spiritual seekers in different directions depending of course, on the level of their consciousness. Do you ever read yourself?”

“Oh, yes, I read a lot, but not exactly books. Books are a waste of time.”

“What do you read, then?” I was really curious.

“Well, many newspapers, magazines, I follow the most interesting programmes on TV – they have many interesting things to say. The scientific channels, for instance. I myself am keen on chemistry and biology and if I happen to read some books, they are in this field. I am really interested, because only science can explain the origin of the world – without Gods”.

I was sitting with my head bowed down, determined to be silent and to accept whatever Natalia had to say, simply in order not to enter into an unequal dispute, but then promptly raised my head.

“What was that? What did you say?”

“That’s right. Only science can prove how man and the world were created, without Gods. By the way, I don’t need science to prove this for me, because my whole life has shown to me that there is no such thing as God. If there was a God, why does he allow wars, natural disasters and such misery in the world among people? I can recommend you something to read about these issues and you will see for yourself that you are studying nonsensical things.”

Well, at this point I had to take the floor.

“See here, my dear, with these few words you defined the makeup of your own mind, which is the polar opposite of mine. If we have common sense, let us stop here, or else we will get into a quarrel! I am writing books exactly against the danger facing mankind as result of such narrow-minded thinking. I can endure anything and I can understand that this is how you chose to live and that your interests do not include spirituality, but to listen to your solemn declarations that science proves the creation of the world without Gods and that there is no God – this I cannot tolerate! Well, it is quite understandable since you are gathering your knowledge and form your culture from the newspapers, magazines and TV – it cannot be different!!! But please do not recommend reading to me – you ought to be ashamed ! Let’s stop talking at least for a minute and come back to our favourite subject – our past.”

We were silent for a few seconds, during which Netty was examining fixedly something on her plate.

“I don’t want to spoil our invaluable friendship because of such disputes”, she slowly began, “but you, Liana, you believe that there is life after death and you write on this subject, and I know for certain, that there is nothing after we die… “

“Here she is!…., who’s starting it again! Won’t you just shut up! – I was getting already angry.”’ Stop it, dear, because if one of us has to stop talking, it is you”, Because believe it or not, thousands of years ago there were great initiates and special schools, and selected people were trained in the secrets of the Universe. Spiritual teachers left us the teachings, which had been secret once, for the creation of man, of the Earth, the goal of the evolution, and so on. Even my mother, who had materialistic thinking like you and believed only what the newspapers and the TV said, even she, living with me and seeing that I read only such books, accepted it in her last years. Yes, she accepted that man does not die after his death. Well, from time to time she said, “You’ll get it if you are lying to me! Tell me, how you can be so sure – no one has come back from there?!” But one could nevertheless explain to her after some time that everyone returned here for a new incarnation, although we don’t remember this. She wanted me to read to her passages from this or that book and she died without fear. But you!!! – You are an unbreakable wall of prejudices! Don’t you even remember that I wrote to you from Denmark twenty-five years ago, after reading a book, which was practically statistics, made by medical doctors only, who had passed through clinical death? Don’t you remember how enthusiastically I wrote to you what each of those doctors said about his personal experience during the coma?! Is this also nonsense?!”

“This, Liana, exactly this, is the biggest nonsense of all”, replied Netty with flat and calm voice. “I was there and… I know that THERE, IS NO NOTHING THERE.”

“Where were you? Where is this “there”?”

“Well, I’ve told you about it…” (She went into long explanations, which I will skip.) “I was in a coma then and ….there was nothing, nothing except complete darkness…”

“You were in a coma?! I didn’t know this… Well, then, how did you experience it, it is impossible that you saw or experienced nothing… all statistics of people falling into a coma tell about various extraordinary experiences…”

“Nothing of the kind!” she cried out and came out of her gloomy composure. “There is simply nothing! Do you understand it, nothing! It was completely dark and… NO NOTHING!”

When I realized at last that she spoke exactly what she really experienced in her state of coma, I felt something I cannot put into words… something very complex to be described, which contained sadness, horror and compassion at the same time. I did not say a word and did not dare look her in the eyes, for I was afraid she might see my thoughts. I knew the meaning of the darkness experienced by her – this is what she carried in her soul, complete darkness. Had she asked me to explain to her if I knew what this darkness meant, I would not have found the strength to do it. As I wrote in my book “Everything Can Be Amended Only in Our Lifetime”, it is absolutely true and it is never too late to correct your mistakes and to change your consciousness and lookout, but you need to have realized this and to be consciously willing to change it. That man is first of all a spiritual being and that he belongs to the spiritual world is something man needs to understand while he is on the Earth – only here one can acquire an understanding, meaningful spirituality. The Earth was created by divine means and only while we are here, by acquiring self-knowledge about our spiritual origin and divine purpose, man can walk on the right path of his evolution. That is why I was shaken, because Natalia not only believed in nothing but also lost her temper. It was injury to her ears to listen to anything else besides what she could believe through her senses, what she saw as existing on the earth.

“Why are you so silent? Liana, dear! Listen, let us stop talking about such nonsense”, she took over in a different mood. “Better tell me what happened with that favourite friend of ours… do you see each other? How is he?”

“No, we don’t see each other”, I replied with a slight smile. “He does not want to see me.”

“I can’t believe it! You can never make me believe this. He was simply unable to live a few hours without your presence

“Yes, it’s difficult to believe, isn’t it… I, too, wouldn’t believe this could ever happen, but it happened…and more - I wouldn’t have the slightest idea what’s going on with him, until three years ago, an unfamiliar man approached me and said I had to help our friend, because… he was in a big trouble, he’s been manipulated by black magic … and even told me who was doing this to him.”

“ Oh,oh, now please just stop this!! I refuse to listen anymore! My ears can bear it even less! There is no such thing! There is no witchcraft! This ignorance is a leftover from simple-minded people, but today, in our modern civilization, there are no such anachronisms. There is no witchcraft, it doesn’t exist… I don’t want to listen and I don’t believe you think it exists…”

I watched quite unperturbed the disgust Netty poured out and I said when she stopped, “Well, then. Let us not argue. No matter if you believe it or not, unfortunately, witchcraft is practiced in Bulgaria to the scope which is difficult to imagine, and it causes also a lot of misery and tragedies. Naturally, this is again an expression of spiritual ignorance, lack of knowledge about the karmic laws and lagging behind evolution, or else it would not have been practiced so extensively, but…”

“There is no BUT!” shouted Netty losing her self-control. “I never believed in any sorts of magic, voodoo-moodoo and the like and I will not tolerate it!… And why are you laughing now?” she stopped short. “This is going too far!”

“Well, I am laughing because in a certain sense I am happy about you. Such people, like you,dead sure that there is no such “ignorance”, are not affected by magic. I wrote about this in the book “Don’t Die Ignorant”. The fear for magic opens the door to its successful application. Fear is one of the greatest enemies of man. That is why our friend, whose mental makeup has always been unstable, full of all kinds of complexes, mainly fears, obviously have made him a victim of such manipulation.”

“No, definitely, I cannot listen to any such crap! And what is worse, you are not the first one to mention this since I’ve been in Bulgaria. No, I will not listen to anything you will tell me and… Liana”, she was already looking at me with concern, “you should take matters earnestly in your hands and read some books suitable for our modern age, written by the right scholars. I can recommend…”

“God forbid, if I come so far as to need you recommend reading to me!” I was already laughing heartily, “Let us stop this absurd talk!”

“Good, I agree. Look here, I had never the intention of interfering in your or anyone else’s life. Let everyone live as he finds fit. I am content with my life. Life is beautiful just as it is, I believe in the achievements of science and I believe in everything, which is HERE AND NOW. But to read all sorts of fabrications and to cram such old book as that… the Bible I mean, into my head, written ages ago by four bearded fuddy-duddies, what were their names? Anyway, I don’t need to remember their names…”

She put in this last fervent and passionate outpouring the whole power of her aversion for the fact that the world was still reading “them” and she used for this such kaleidoscopic, original, witty and inimitable vocabulary (qualities she has always possessed), that I fell into a situation where I did not believe what I heard. It was not the first time I met people with this kind of extreme materialism, but I had then at that very moment the prototype of this category of people sitting opposite me! I couldn’t have come across this prototype even if I had deliberately looked for it.

“Netty, dear Netty, wait, please, stop for a moment this verbiage. You don’t know what you just said! You are the ideal prototype of this kind of people with extreme materialistic thinking. I intended to write on this issue long ago and I collected a lot of material from various people, but just now you left me speechless! You are the prototype I was looking for, if I am to portrait it faithfully!”

“Well, write, then, whatever you want ”, she waved her hand and made a face.

“ Yes I will, but I cannot repeat what you just said. Don’t you understand this? In order to present faithfully all the things you said as your view of life, I have to use your own words. Please, I am asking you with all my heart, I know that you are staying only two more days in Sofia, but when you go home, as soon as you find some time, please write me in a letter just the same things you said – your view of the world in your own words.”

“No, no, definitely no – I hate both, letters and writing. I won’t do it. But you challenged me to tell you what I think…”

“Exactly, this is the real reason, but you still can’t understand my point! Your thinking and your world outlook are in total disagreement with mine. If I render your speech in my language, it would not be the same and I could misrepresent your words…”

“Well then, I am giving you fully the right to render and retell the way you want to and what you find fit from this conversation, since you find it interesting….Only don’t mention my real name.”

“You still don”t get it,do you? What you said, was an original masterpiece of the restricted materialistic thinking and I could not find the same words, I wouldn’t be capable of doing it!”

“Write just what you want to!” nodded Netty her consent and so this conversation and meeting ended with fun.

On my way home I was walking deeply thoughtful still feeling shocked by her spontaneous materialistic revelations and I was amazed and disappointed, that some of the people closest to me were living in total darkness. Not only this, but they were standing up for their right to live in this darkness and even got angry, if someone tried to speak only about any other reality, except the one we saw and lived in. So strong were my feelings, when I experienced again the meaning of what she said, and at a certain point I realized that I had fallen unconsciously into a spiritual state only I was familiar with, where through my feelings, in an inner way, the whole Cosmos was listening to me. That strange and, thank God, rare experience flooded in me, in which, if I did not manage to keep full control over my mental equilibrium, other beings from the soul world could intervene with their thoughts. I immediately exercised control over myself and regained my composure.

On the following day, the first thing I did was to phone Natalia and ask her again to repeat her “masterpieces” from the previous day. She laughed defensively.

“No, dear, I can’t repeat them, but I gave you the go-ahead to write and render them the way you like it, didn’t I!?”

“That’s right, but it will not be the same! Please, tell me only what did you say about the Evangelists – the four writing the New Testament of the Bible?”

“Well, I only said that it was useless to read that old book written by four gaga fuddy-duddies telling bullshit about Jesus Christ”, I was already busy writing down her words. “Why on earth should they cram into our heads that Christ came 2000 years ago to save us? Well, I would ask them, why Christ doesn’t come down on the earth now and fix things up. Where is He now?!”

We managed to part friendly, without quarrelling. I was glad that somehow I managed to worm out several sentences, which were her authentic utterances. I wrote the others consulting the notes I put down straight after coming back home, realizing, that the written words were nothing but a pale copy of her personality.

LET US ACCEPT THE DIFFERENT OUTLOOK AND WORLDVIEW OF OUR RELATIVES WITH UNDERSTANDING AND LOVE

Among the few blood relatives I have, I maintain permanent contact only with two. Both of them are highly educated women, who used to have a very active social life in their youth. They are retired now and have more time for their personal interests and pursuits. Both of them are equally close to me as blood relations. With one of them I keep only occasional contact, which is my own fault. It seems I am unable to find the time to meet her, which is a pity, because she has broad spiritual interests and shows strong willingness for more information. Her attitude so far has tended more towards the eastern wisdom and philosophy, I presume, because it has been easier to find sources in this area in Bulgaria. She reads with interest my books, too, and she is ready to widen her horizons as far as my parameters, but I confess it is my fault that I don’t find the time for a person who is not only my relative, but is also actively seeking expansion of her spiritual knowledge.

With my other relation (I will give her the provisional name Katia) we are closer, tied up through a strong attachment, which might have been inherited as something acquired from our parents. As children, we were totally different in every respect. Since as a singer in Bulgaria I endured constant repression about my looks, stage beheaviour and my repertoire had to pass through strict censorship, my relatives and all Bulgarians neither did see me or hear me in my authentic stage performance and presence. That’s why even today, Katia has only a vague idea of my artistic capacities. Our political views were also polar opposites, and concerning our spiritual orientation – there was and there still is no place for compatibility. She has a modern entirely materialistic attitude to life, interested (without extremes) in scholarly recognition, and concerning religion, spiritual or esoteric pursuits, her interest amounts to zero. She does not want to know, to read or even listen to such issues. She sorts out my books at an honourable place in her library because of the messages they contain and as a gift from a closely related person, but I don’t believe she has ever read them, because she has never discussed them. With this dearest relative of mine we have never quarrelled due to the genuine affection between us and we have never argued on political, religious or spiritual issues. Our love tolerates the huge differences between us. We never miss to be together on holy and traditional festivals, because we value the time we still have to share and we both know that it will not last forever.

So, Katia has no idea who am I actually as artist or from the spiritual aspect. For her, I am still the child, growing up together with her and tied up to her with strong family connections, that’s all. All my efforts to introduce to her at least the basics of the spiritual information needed by modern mankind were sharply rejected while still at the start. She says that she is not interested and that she does not even care. Strangely enough, however, at the same time she encourages her own daughter to seek my spiritual orientation and guidance. It is very painful to see a beloved person destroying her health and bringing herself to an early grave out of foolishness, and although you know a lot, lots of things, which might help her – you cannot actually help her! What can I do?! Unwilling as she is to ask for my help in this respect, each insistence on my behalf would mean intruding to her own views and choice.…

During the hot months of that summer, I discovered a sort of white fish and I invented my own way of cooking it. The specialty became better and better, because I improved it each time. Then, when I was going to cook it next, I thought that it would be a shame not to share this pleasure with someone. Suddenly I remembered Katia, who loved fish, so I phoned her and invited her to lunch. She readily accepted my invitation. The lunch took place on the following day. We enjoyed all salads and starters I had prepared, but when the fish specialty was served, Katia went into real was really carried away. I knew that she would appreciate it and enjoy it and this was the aim of our meeting. She wrote all details of the recipe and assured me that she would make it a part of her culinary experience. While she was taking a tasty bite from the food, she closed her eyes and gave out sounds of gastronomic pleasure.

“M-m-m… eating is such a supreme relish. It is the most permanent and accessible human pleasure!” said Katia with a philosophical tone. “We will never be able to have enough of it or overjoy it, because man increases all the time his inventiveness and there are no limits to his imagination concerning food.”

“That’s right, there are no limits”, I agreed.

“And you say… yes, you often say,,that this peasure, eating with gusto, we will not have anymore, when we die”.

“That’s right, unfortunately… but on the other hand, some time after we die and get rid of our human passions and frailties, we will not feel any more the need to either eat or drink…”

“But, Liana, this is disgusting!” interrupted me Katia. “How am I to imagine a life without any of these pleasures…? Aren’t there at least some compensations or substitutes?”

“ Sorry – there are none”, I shrugged my shoulders and laughed. “You are now asking just like my friend Niki did, who has a good occult training unlike you – when we last met here, having an occasion to celebrate with a rich meal and drinks, he suddenly exclaimed, “Dearest Liana, what now? Prepare us and accept that when we leave our earthly life and go in the spiritual world, we will not find this gusto there! Really not there at all?! It’s impossible! There should be at least something!”

“ The man is right. That’s how I think, too”, agreed Katia with understanding.

“Well, for you it is different, you are allowed to think so, but I scolded him, because he knows enough about life after death, better than to ask me such questions ‘hoping’ that it might be not quite like this… I repeated to him what I had learned twenty-five years ago from the eastern theosophical books, that after death, not immediately, but some time after that, there would be a field resembling Disneyland. According to them, this sphere is populated with souls who create and build houses, institutes, hospitals, libraries and devices with the force of their thought… Things they desired, but did not have on the earth for one or another reason. That is why they had houses and structures of all kinds there, without a definite style and taste, but as result of human imagination. I read there that it was the meeting place for people who had the same mental attitude at a given time – they meet, make parties just like on the earth, serve various meals and drinks, which they loved while living… Generally, they create for themselves the same pleasant conditions they had in their memories, even more refined and elegant than on the earth, because it happens that one may not have money to create such luxury during his lifetime, but he can create it there with his thought…”

“ How about that! This is not bad at all ! Well, then, that’s what I will do, too”, burst into mighty laughter Katia.

“Yes, Niki’s reaction was the same, but I reminded him what he read and kept forgetting… that those parties last only until a certain time. Whatever you imagine and serve on the table for eating and drinking, will be in the beginning a certain pleasure, while your memory of taste lasts. For example, the taste of the whisky, the brandy, the chicken, the pork, the pastry and whatever you liked while living… and… some time later you will understand with disappointment that it was all an illusion…”

“Why illusion? Don’t they create it themselves?” Katia was puzzled.

“ Yes, they do, but soon they will realize that they don’t feel anything. You see, since you don’t have your body and physical organs any more – stomach, intestines, liver, tongue, blood, etc… no matter how accurately you imagine and visualize it, even if you still remember the taste, you don’t feel the pleasure, which comes with eating a cake, alcohol or favourite food. There comes a time, when you stop with this game, because it is not amusing any more. Do you understand me?”

“I do”, Katia nodded with philosophical expression looking at me thoughtfully. “BUT! You cannot scare me! I will manage it, whatever the situation… And besides, I don’t care what will happen after I die!” she suddenly raised her voice and roared with laughter.

I knew that our conversation with her on this subject would be useless and remained silent. After her carefree outburst, she also grew quiet and lapsed into silence, and I decided that I had to say something more reassuring.

“Look, here, Katia, this thing concerning our habits, weaknesses, passions for eating, smoking, drinking, sex, etc. is a subject, which is in my opinion more exciting for people with somewhat elementary views. But for people like you… There are more important things to know while you are living, in terms of inner certainty, because they can be learned only here, on the earth, it will be too late beyond there…”

“I don’t care!” she insisted stubbornly.

“It cannot be true that you don’t care?! Why are you pretending to be a silly- happy-go-lucky, when you are not?! This is the same as, for example, knowing that you will have to leave for a distant country to live there for a time, or even for good. Any reasonable man will prepare in advance, finding information about the climate, what clothes he will need to take, what language is spoken there, what is the currency, the food and so on… This is the same. Having accomplished our earthly pilgrimage, we go to our spiritual motherland where we don’t have our physical bodies any more. There is nothing there of what we are used to have here on the earth and we suddenly find ourselves in a world totally different from our earthly ideas and conditions. If you don’t want to experience complete confusion out of ignorance and stress from the place you will find yourself, the best thing would be to get ready with the necessary information, while you are still living. Well, it is true that such information should come from a serious spiritual source and authority, because there is a surplus of books today, which carry ineffective information for our present time. You are lucky to have me! Don’t you want to know where you are going after you die and how to get ready for this? Knowledge is the greatest power.”

“No, I don’t want to! I don’t and that’s it !” she repeated stubbornly and wilfully. “I do have you, but for some other useful information.”

“ Anyway, just think, now is the moment…. with this disease of yours, when you need most urgently conscious faith, spiritual assistance… Oh, well,who am I talking to! You don’t know even the Lord’s Prayer! Would you like…”

“I knew it and I said it regularly before my father died…” she grumbled evasively.

“I will teach you how to say this prayer with the meaning Christ put into it. Each line refers to strengthening our bodies, the visible and the invisible, our whole spiritual structure and our relationship to God. I can tell you other prayers, too.”

“I don’t need your prayers. I know what to tell God when I want something and when I pray to God…” she waved away my proposal.

“That’s all right, if you have found your own way to say your prayer, it’s even better. Our relationship to Him should be personal. The question is ‘are you searching for Him’, or you think prayer is nonsense?”

Katia did not reply, but she arched her eyebrows and bent her head with an expressive gesture, meaning ‘it’s my own business how I pray’. Her facial expression changed, showing a state of mind with reserved parameters, which she did not want to share with anyone. While I was watching her silently, I remembered with lightning speed countless of other impressions from her reactions. She never blasphemed, but accepted as something natural and traditional the prayer which I read when we sat at the table, she encouraged me to teach her daughter in spiritual matters, but she simply did not have any personal interest either in religion or spiritual sciences. Several times, in critical situations in her life, she confessed that she experienced something very intimate of spiritual nature, but refused to share it with me. I never pressed her to tell me what she cherished for herself. At that point I realized that she had a lot of fears hidden deep within, which she did not reveal. (Anthroposophy explains such fears and my friend, associate professor Ivanka Kirova, anthroposophist for many years and author of a number of books, wrote an interesting essay on this subject. I will try to put down the essence, without injuring the detailed presentation of this issue and I find a place for it after this story.)

“Katia, I would never intrude in your reserved space of mentality, but you are my closest person on the earth, I know you very well and that is why I feel that at some point we simply cross each other. We don’t have a dialogue because you withdraw into yourself almost aggressively refusing to talk on spiritual issues. If it wasn’t for your conspicuous righteousness all your life, highly moral disposition and attitude to everything, to each worldly issue or action, I would have left you to “slumber your life away”. I am just trying to find explanation for myself.

Katia kept obstinately silent, sipping slowly the vodka from her glass, so I continued, “The most important thing for modern people is to work out moral categories during their lifetime. Unfortunately, our world is far from being moral yet. You, however, have developed to a high degree the moral tendencies in yourself. This is wonderful, but not enough, because the absence of interest in spiritual knowledge is fatal. Most people, in the frantic race and growing materialism today, fail to acquire in their mind impulses from the spiritual world. These people, you among them, will pass through the portal of death without any anticipation of spiritual facts. If they had certain spiritual interests and pursuits on the earth, they would carry them across with themselves after their death. This would be an invaluable wealth. But most people in today’s world, our materialistic and sleeping mankind, do not have such interests and pursuits at the time of their death. Do you know what awaits such people after their earthly death, a little later, passing from one sphere to a higher sphere? LONELINESS. This loneliness equals to death in the spiritual world and…”

“Stop talking bullshit because I am getting tired listening to it!” cried cheerfully Katia after a huge gulp of vodka. “Who do you think you are telling these tall stories to? I am he most sociable person both here and THERE. Even if I don’t know exactly how it will be, I know I will have a lot of friends! So, shut up now!”

“Yes, but it’s only what you are thinking it will be. In the beginning, in the first period after death, it is very important that you were sociable, that you had friends, but after that, higher up in the moral sphere, talking about you, you will be again in a good situation, because you will meet kindred souls, but later,still higher?! If you did not have any idea of religion, of God, of some religious attitude – loneliness will follow. This is what I tried to explain…”

“ So what! It doesn’t matter! So be it, then! Frankly my dear I don’t give a damn how it will be after I die! I will have a rest at last, that’s where I will have a rest…”

“Tell me, Katia, why are you deliberately pretending to be frivolous and narrow-minded, or you are really not interested? Is it possible that you don’t care?! Mankind is afraid of death en masse and everyone would give his eyetooth to learn something about his life beyond death.. On the other hand, if one is credulous and collects information from here and there, this is even more dangerous than ignorance, because it can be easily manipulated by evil beings.”

“I don’t care! How many times do you want me to repeat it”, laughed Katia. “Let come what may! I am not afraid of death either. While I am alive, I am interested in everything in life, and after I die…”

“Don’t speak so frivolously, because you are not the kind. Please listen to me”, I said quietly, but firmly. “Our world borders to another world, a supersensible world and the interference of this supersensible, metaphysical world in our visible physical world has never been so intensive as today. Only we, people, do not notice anything. This world cannot be seen with our physical sight. And if man does not prepare consciously on the earth with knowledge of the Spirit and get familiar with the Spirit here, in the conditions of the physical world, he will never learn how terrible it is to destroy a human soul after death…”

“I don’t care! Don’t you see that I don’t care about what follows after death!” she insisted doggedly.

“All right, then”, I sighed accepting the fact. “There is something, however, which I would like to make clear for myself… Remember, you have personally stood amidst the piles of letters I received, you read some of them and wanted to help me then, didn’t you? Don’t you remember that you were horrified? “Oh, dear Liana! How can you possibly read all this! It is so burdening, all this human misery!” Well, when you see that so many people want an appointment with me, see me or hear personally and learn something from me on the subject they are interested in, why you of all people, you, who are closest to me, why have you never made use of what I can give you?”

At this point she became serious again, entering in that wrapped and closed state. She kept silent for some time and then she spoke, “You know that I used to read before, but now I cannot read any more”.

“ I know that, but I offered you so many times to meet you separately and speak to you about the most important things that one should know…”

“Did I ever refuse you? Maybe you were not insistent enough”, she defended herself limply.

“Oh, is that so?! What about last Christmas?” Only now I decided to confess the bitterness I was keeping to myself all this time. “Do you remember that when we were half-way through the festive dinner and enjoying a pleasant family atmosphere, I offered you and your daughter, ‘Would you like me, when we have finished with the dinner, to tell you something about the birth of Jesus from Nazareth, about His Baptism in the River Jordan and about the descent of the Christ in his sheaths?’ You interrupted me in a loud angry voice, ‘No, I will not allow you to spoil my Christmas! Maybe some other time, maybe tomorrow…’ I did not reply then, but this ‘tomorrow’ never came, because I have no right to impose it on you, provided that you are even not interested. Is there a more appropriate moment for such a story of the Holy Night? Do you know that a long time ago Christmas used to awake the deepest feelings and faithful love to the Christ Being, whose coming to the Earth was prepared by the Holy Birth of Jesus? Since then, things have been changing more and more. Man is becoming increasingly material and has drifted away from the Spirit. CHRISTMAS HAS LOST ITS TRUE SPIRITUAL MEANING AND HAS BECOME AN ENTIRELY MATERIALISTIC FESTIVAL. Festival of giving out presents, of sumptuous eating and drinking, just another occasion to have fun in the family, but in an entirely materialistic form. What did we speak about during that evening? The new ornaments you bought for the Christmas tree, the Christmas decorations and lighting, made guesses about who will get the lucky coin, reminded each other not to burn the pumpkin pasty…”

“ How about all the other traditional rituals !?Didn’t I observe the seven vegetable meals, incensing the house, breaking the round bread and allotting the first piece to Holy Mary, then to the house, to…”

“This is a superficial observation of the age-long tradition. Even the Christmas music, which I specially took with me, you did not listen to it, your son took away the discs. Don’t you see? Everything is experienced externally, in a materialistic manner! Do you know that this festival was once experienced in inner light and love, and that the human souls connected to the higher experiences of the Cosmos, because on that night the heavens open to the earth and many sensitive souls can receive their gift…”

“What gift?” interrupted immediately Katia.

“I’m not going to tell you. This can be communicated to someone who is deeply interested and is seeking the Christ impulse. Our human task is to bring again Christ in our Christmases. Although materialism obscured the knowledge about Christ, an awakening with growing understanding about Christ can be achieved through spiritualization of the arts and of all kinds of earthly creativity, spiritualization of nature… we must learn to contemplate nature with heart feelings, to awaken our religious feelings…” I kept on wishfully and heaved an involuntary sign. “All right, then, you have shown a notable patience to listen to me!”

“On the contrary” Katia replied calmly and without enthusiasm “ If you find the appropriate time when I can concentrate my attention on what you are saying, I would listen to you. As a matter of fact, I don’t feel like listening, if you don’t answer promptly the questions arising in me while listening.”

“Well, here we are! That’s the real trouble… If you want to grasp the essence, when you are told ‘something’ new, for which you did not put in any effort or determination to read personally and to find out its meaning, you should listen carefully, maybe even take down notes and not ask questions at this stage. What you’ve heard will flow into you and if you think it over in the form you heard it and let it stay with you in spite of the questions you have, the answers will come in time with your perseverance. You are asking me questions in a bossy manner and it sounds like this, ‘Better answer my questions first and I will decide if it is worth listening to you or not!’ Getting knowledge my dear, it doesn’t work forcing it in this way!... This is a gift for you, which, if it is not appreciated, would be better not given. Man should strive to find the true road leading to a genuine understanding of Christ, and then unexpected feelings will follow… love and reverence, and new healing forces. Christmas should be experienced with holy thoughts and feelings, thinking about that Divine Birth, which, if we are aware of its nature, will make us only then capable of understanding our own human nature. The forces with which we were born do not suffice to reach our true human predestination – man should be also born spiritually. Until Christ has not been completely grasped, taken into and experienced at Christmas, we will not receive the necessary Christ forces for this second spiritual birth. People today still don’t feel the need for a new spiritual birth and for taking the Christ energies into themselves. They are not awake to consciousness. But each human soul consciously or unconsciously meets Christ at Christmastime during the night liturgy. In the holy midnight hour, the Angelic hosts encircle the earth, radiating and streaming down an impulse in the form of warmth of love, peace, enthusiasm for good. This can be felt be every believer and by the more sensitive persons, and sometimes even by the most hardened and godless people. Many authors today write about man’s evolution, about his successes and achievements, about his divinity, but very few people as yet know who Christ is really and why He is our Saviour. Only Christ’s coming down on the earth and His self-sacrifice made possible the rise of man into spiritual heights. For earthly mankind, the central focus of moral life is the Christ impulse. That is why man must meet the Christ impulse on the earthly plane. Man should realize that his chief goal in coming down to the earth is to receive in himself the Christ impulse.

“Well, I was christened.too. So I received the Christ impulse, didn’t I?”

“It’s not enough”, I replied with a smile. “You were christened with the Holy Spirit, as prescribed by the faithful Christian tradition, but in order to receive the Christ impulse in yourself, you need to awaken spiritually… By developing self-knowledge, you will come to the Christ impulse, too. You are shouting loud now that you don’t care, but when you return to your spiritual motherland, you will understand what you had missed, while you were on the earth. People, who are not interested in spirituality and tear themselves away from the spiritual, who have no spiritual attitude and don’t want to read or listen to something spiritual – such people after death, even if they had moral disposition, on the next higher level become hermits. Nothing else can be done for them and they stay in isolation until their next reincarnation, where they will have a new chance to make a step towards the Spirit.”

Katia was looking calmly at me, obviously untouched by what she heard, then she shrugged her shoulders, “Well, you said it now. I will always have another chance… sometimes. Why worry now?”

“You are asking why? Because all different diseases in your life are probably a result of your non-spiritual attitude. A healthy etheric body and healthy organs can be acquired in the next life with conscious and active spiritual activity and recognizing the spiritual origin of man. now, while you’re living on earth. If you just tried to read my latest book, whose title only suggests a lot, ‘Everything Can Be Amended Only in Our Lifetime’, you would understand. Look here, it is deeply painful for me that my love for you is not sufficient to pull you out from your ‘sleeping’ and non-spiritual state… Yes, I already anticipate your objection that you are not non-spiritual, but going to the theatre and listening to concerts is quite different spiritual need. I will ask you to remember at least this one maxim and to think it over every day:

It is a karmic law and necessity, that what is spiritual in man in one life, manifests in the next life in his physical body.

And this one, too: The new healing of our time is when man uses the power of his I for the good of the others (not only for his children and beloved, but for all other people). And lastly I want to tell you this – I know that you are not so spiritually narrow-minded, but it’s rather that you feel a certain fear before the unknown after death. This is the most natural thing and everyone feels the same until one does not acquire a certain knowledge and understanding about his own spiritual nature. I advise you to read the book ‘Life between Death and Rebirth’ by Dr. Rudolf Steiner. In the book, this great scholar and seer has explained scientifically in detail what happens after death and why it is necessary, while we are on the earth, to develop self-knowledge and spiritual life – because only the forces, which we have developed on the earth, can be taken with us beyond the threshold of death.”

This time again, like always, in spite of the differences between us, we parted with Katia with affection, happy that we still exsist and could spend time together.

THE IDEA OF CHRIST AND OUR CONNECTION WITH HIM

Today, in our culture, the name of Christ occupies too little space, and very few people know as yet the truth about who Christ is and why He is called the Saviour of mankind. True knowledge of Christ leads in a natural way each person to reverence and divine adoration. The truth about Christ and why He is truly the Saviour of mankind is now widely accessible to everybody, but it can be reliably found only in the spiritual science of Anthroposophy and in the teaching of Master Peter Dunov. I am speaking about the literature, which can be easily found in Bulgaria.

Today, the name of Christ is mentioned and praised only during the Christian festivals of Christmas and Easter as a beautiful tradition, surviving the crises of time and history. But we should know so many other things, things which are essential, about Christ and about mankind’s connection with Him.

For example, if we are to understand correctly reincarnation and destiny, we need to have also a true understanding of Christ. The more understanding we imbue about Christ in the course of our earthly life, the more He will become our guide through the complicated cosmic relationships after death – when we leave the earth and set out on the long journey to the Zodiac and back, returning to a new incarnation on the earth. When we get to know Christ and His significance for the evolution of earthly mankind, while we are still on the earth, our life acquires a completely new meaning. We then start living with quite another understanding and accepting the ordeals on our way of life, which also gives us its fruits after death. The more correct understanding man acquires of Christ, while still living on the earth, the more he will dress himself in IMPERISHABILITY and rise to an ever clearer I-consciousness. This is actually the mission of Christ.

It is time, and as a matter of fact, now is the correct time, while we are living on the earth, to learn as much as possible about Christ, so that our soul could attain to the right mood. This means that our soul should start already feeling that it cannot possibly achieve its rightful development, as envisaged in the evolution, by itself, without the FORCES given to it by Christ. These forces, connecting us ever more strongly to the Christ impulse cannot emerge in us without our conscious search and commitment to the Christ forces.

Those people, who feel nothing and don’t care learning about Christ, those, who go through their earthly life without connecting themselves in some way to Christ – the earthly way of their destiny will become ever more difficult, full of suffering, which they will be unable to explain. Such people will feel an increasingly stronger disharmony in themselves, a subconscious dissatisfaction, depressions, will experience a feeling of disorganization. The reasons for this will be their inability to relate correctly to their karma and destiny. In other words, they will not be in the right accord and harmony with the Cosmos.

If man is to understand correctly this last sentence I formulated above, he must definitely acquire knowledge about Christ and His role in the human evolution. This is not something, which can be learned in 5 or 50 words, but in the first place one should have willingness to learn and consequently allocate time for study, reflection and understanding.

According to the Spiritual Science of Anthroposophy, from the point of view of cosmic evolution, the physical body of man is his oldest structure, which has been worked upon by Spiritual Beings of various ranks in the Hierarchy during the period of the so-called Old Saturn. The next period of the Earth’s incarnation is called the Old Sun, during which the physical body of man, once again through the assistance of sublime Spiritual Beings in the Hierarchy was reorganized so that it could receive the etheric body. In the next period, called the Old Moon, again through the spiritual intervention of the Hierarchy, man received the astral body, and during the Earth period, the human body was formed again and placed in the upright position already, so that it could become the bearer of the Ego, of the I. The mission of the Earth is to make possible the free development of the I, which should express love in such a way that at the end of Earth’s evolution everything should be penetrated with love. In what lies still ahead, man should take up his role in the creative world process with responsibility and love.

In order to achieve this goal, the Ego – the I needs the physical body, which is the mirror of the I-consciousness.

Nevertheless, when we speak about the physical, etheric and astral bodies created during the above mentioned periods, we should not imagine anything like our present physical body. The aim of the formative Beings, who created man, was not endowing him with a visible physical body like it is today. The body, created by them at that time, was a transparent net-like form of matter, which represented the spiritual form of the physical body. This is described pictorially as the Fall in the Bible.

During the Lemurian epoch, the germ of the I had already been given to the most advanced human beings in the development, but they were still far away from the time, when they would become I-conscious. After Lucifer’s temptation, working in the human astral body, a series of complex reactions started operating, “falls”, which mixed up the spiritual essence of the human physical body. This spiritual essence of the physical body is called by Rudolf Steiner “the phantom of the human body”. The phantom has always been invisible and is still now invisible for our eyes.

After the interferences of the Luciferic beings, material substances were gradually implanted in this fine spiritual net-like form of the physical body, until it became dense and visible, as we have it today. That, however, which was immortal in the human body until that time accepted mortality and became perishable, accepted death.

Later, the Ahrimanic forces (the satanic forces) got also involved and together with the Luciferic (devil’s) influences contributed for the disorganization of the primary spiritual form of man, made it confused and too strongly attached to the mineral elements. As a result, the energies of death became so powerful that life on the Earth was going to cease if that continued longer. The most important thing was that the spiritual essence of the physical body, the phantom, which has always been, and still is, invisible, became so dense and dark that it could not accompany any more the soul and the spirit after death. In this manner, the feeling for the I became duller and duller and there arose a clear danger of losing the I-consciousness. If man’s phantom could not be restored, it was possible that the mission of the Earth could not be fulfilled. This restoration of the phantom or the spiritual form, or the original of the physical body, through which the I had to be saved, could not be performed by man or by another Higher Hierarchy, but by a Divine Being only. It had to be such Being, who could be free from any influences of Lucifer and Ahriman. This Being was Christ.

The appearance of Christ on the Earth, of the God, Who descended to the Earth and sacrificed Himself in order to save the I of man is an event of such magnitude that there is nothing to compare it to! For this reason, there are many mistaken views today about Him. The time of today, 21st century, demands from man new understanding by creating new concepts and ideas, which are already related to the supersensible world and to the Spiritual Hierarchies. Very few people think of the supersensible world from this point of view as yet. The man of our time has a superficial idea about the worlds he does not see, but it is more or less an idea about certain extraterrestrials, in which he does not believe either, or about which has such a distorted idea that we can only laugh. It is high time for man to change his thinking, i.e. to stop accepting and explaining things and phenomena only within the framework of what he actually sees, but to uplift his thinking to understand and create concepts about the Spiritual Worlds, about the Spiritual Hierarchies and Beings. They are as yet invisible for us, but it is time we know that they are much more closely related to man that we can surmise and that they are taking care for the correct development of mankind all the time. If we manage to uplift our thinking above the limitations of our materialistic science and surroundings, we would achieve wonders.

I am aware of the fact that a lot people in our times, who are strong believers and make efforts to be good Christians, accept only the Bible as their guide and don’t want to hear the deeper truths offered today by Anthroposophy. It is true that the Bible is by far the greatest book of the truth, but for the time being man understands too little of it. In order to understand it, he should gradually raise his thinking up to the Spirit, since the Gospel writers themselves, who left us their four Gospels, were people with “initiation”. Besides, each of them had a different kind and level of initiation, which resulted in certain differences in the Gospels.

The concept “initiation” cannot possibly give us today reliable ideas of what it really means. It is a different thing if someone has studied purposefully one of the esoteric sciences. The “initiations” in ancient times were not only given to people really deserving access to cosmic secrets, but were also a very complicated and dangerous process, performed by skilful wise men and high priests. During that process of initiation, the neophyte had to be extracted out of his own physical body. Even the Adepts and the initiates of the East were out of their body during the initiation, because it was clear for all initiates from the pre-Christian age that even if they reached the most outer limits of the physical body, they did not touch the forces of the physical body. Why was that? Until the Mystery of Golgotha and the wonder performed on the Earth through Christ’s death (the Resurrection), men, when dying, spent a certain length of time between their death and their next incarnation in the higher worlds, but coming to their new incarnation, they brought down from the Spiritual World an imperfect, predestined for destruction phantom (the spiritual invisible part of the physical body). This means that after their death on the Earth, people could not bring to life a complete phantom of the physical body. While mankind can actually draw near the purpose of its evolution only through this phantom, through its genuine forces, such as they were given to it with the Creation, but lost after “The Fall”. This is the reason for the great sacrifice given by Christ to mankind. Dying on the cross and pouring His blood into the Earth, He connected Himself with the Earth and became part of it and part of mankind. Thus, He made it possible for us through the Death on Golgotha to save the human I and to give possibility for the resurrection of the physical body.

WHY WE NEED TODAY TO FILL OURSELVES MORE AND MORE WITH CORRECT UNDERSTANDING OF WHAT IT WAS EXACTLY WHAT CHRIST GAVE TO MAN. WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THE EXPRESSION “THE MYSTERY OF GOLGOTHA”

It is true that the greatness of the most sublime historical Mystery in the evolution of the earth – Christ becoming man and connecting Himself with the earth evolution and with man – is still far above the ordinary understanding. We, however, are living in a new time, I would say, in the time, which calls us to expand and deepen this understanding. Christ is the only God, Who has passed through death. This death is a supreme act of self-sacrifice, in order to rescue the correct course of human development, the human I, which needed to be rescued. The greatest proof for the rescuing act of Christ consisted in the fact that His own phantom triumphed by resurrection after His crucifixion, and His disciples saw It. First Mary and after her the other disciples, they saw Him, but this first unique Resurrection was for them, too, both unfamiliar and even incredible, because they saw that spiritual part, which was invisible for the human eyes, but they already had the spiritual vision to see it. That is why men will wonder for a long time to come what really happened and what they could believe in, for they don’t have spiritual understanding and knowledge, but they still rely only on their physical vision and believe only what they see with their physical eyes.

The Resurrection of Christ is actually the birth of a new constituent of the human nature – the imperishable body – which man lost with The Fall and the Mystery of Golgotha provided the path to retrieve it. If we are to understand why Christ’s deed is the most sublime self-sacrifice of such nature, which is beyond comparison, because He is a God, we will have to lift ourselves spiritually in terms of understanding and consciousness, and to grasp the following:

In order to rescue this human phantom, the spiritual invisible part of the physical body, a God had to come down from His incomparable heights and there had also to be a Being like Jesus from Nazareth, born in a divine manner and unique in his nature and purity, in order to provide a physical body, an etheric body, an astral body and an I – not a human I, but a Divine I – Christ’s I. He rose, so that mankind could some day see and understand that this happened through the mighty powers of the spiritual part of the physical body, which before His interference and His sacrifice had been unusable for the purposes of the evolution.

It is sad that most people today only revere and cherish the memory of Christ’s death on Golgotha, which is still grasped only as disgraceful and inexplicable – why that death was necessary and permitted, since He was a God?! The time will come when everybody will know, that exactly with this still unintelligible death on the cross, exactly since that moment things changed for man, permitting him to join again the ascending gradation of his development. Ever since that great moment, man has the possibility to incorporate in himself what is called the “imperishable” body, the body he had lost. Christ redeemed the I of man exactly at the moment when man did not reincarnate as “man”, but managed to preserve only the image and the substance he had before coming down to his physical incarnations. This is what Christ bestowed with His self-sacrifice on Golgotha, a self-sacrifice still too little understood.

I hope that everyone wishing to know these things in details and to make them worthwhile for himself will find a stimulus on these pages and in what I am trying to give here as a brief explanation about something which is so very complex to understand and rationalize. For such a person the best thing will be to find the extraordinary book by Rudolf Steiner “From Jesus to Christ” – this is the source, out of which the aspirant can personally drink.

The whole accessible anthroposophical literature is offered today to modern man, who is interested to know the truth about Christ, and it is only a matter of man’s willingness to raise his consciousness through his mind. For man is so constituted, that even if he has not yet achieved clairvoyance with his spiritual organs, he can still understand through his mind’s power the Mystery of Golgotha and most of the world secrets, which are accessible, but complex to comprehend.

The ever controversial subject of our time, the issue of freedom, over which people argue with abstract thoughts, will remain in the same way misunderstood until we have acquired understanding about the self-sacrifice of Christ. Our freedom will be achieved only when we can realize with understanding through knowledge, that we owe our freedom to Christ.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ACCEPTING A PIECE OF WISDOM WITHOUT ITS PERMEATION BY CHRIST AND ACCEPTING IT ILLUMINATED BY THE LIGHT OF CHRIST

Naturally, since man has the freedom to choose, he has the right to choose himself the way, by which he will decide the course of his development on the Earth. For example, there are a lot of highly educated people, who are also spiritual, but they follow other spiritual sciences which are not concerned with Christ and His Deed. There is, however, difference whether we accept a piece of wisdom without its permeation by Christ, or we accept a piece of wisdom illuminated by the light of Christ. Maybe someone who was not involved with spiritual studies will be puzzled about the meaning of what I’ve just said. It is true that one can acquire wisdom in many ways, provided that he is ripe to acquire it. I’ve had the opportunity of meeting often in my life the two kinds of wisdom and even if wisdom always deserves respect and devotion, I can see now the meaning and the huge difference between the wisdom, which is not permeated by the Christ and the wisdom, which is permeated by Christ. If one soul is permeated by Christ, what is flowing through it is something useful for all mankind, because Christ is the God Who belongs to and takes care of all mankind.

There were countless of other sublime deeds, which Christ had done before it became necessary for Him to come down to the Earth. But as time passed, due to the “falls”, the human I became so darkened and dense that it could not enter the spiritual world any more and after his death, man could not related to that world and experience his inner spirituality in his I. That is why Christ God came down on the Earth uniting with the body of Jesus, i.e. ensuring that man would not lose the Divine, which had been implanted in him. Exactly at the time when man had already lost his connection with the divine, the lofty Christ God entered earthly life. Since that time, wherever there is firm understanding about Christ, wherever the Christ impulse flows, the benefits of life are already fruits not only for the individual who has acquired them, but they bring blessings for all mankind. When our spiritual knowledge is permeated by Christ, He does not take away the fruits of our achievements and exertions, but as He carried the suffering of all people on the earth, when we raise ourselves spiritually to the knowledge, which should be actually knowledge of each earthly man – we need to think “Not I, but Christ in me”. This can happen only when we reach that point where we feel that everything we have acquired in our life as personal achievements, knowledge and strength in our actions and attainments, as a blessing from the joys of worldly life, all these things were acquired through the power of Christ. If we have taken consciously in ourselves something of the Christ impulse, after our death Christ will take upon Himself our ideals. It will be worth thinking over the meaning of the words “our ideals” – I would not like to give an interpretation, but each one can think over for himself which his own ideals are. Someone might say, “Why should Christ take up my ideals?” It is not easy to give a simple explanation for this. It would be better perceived if one can read Rudolf Steiner’s book “Christ and the Human Soul”. This great and comprehensive scientist, who acquired clairvoyance unattainable for our time and who was a great initiate of our time, told us about the different action of something which is entrusted to a soul permeated with Christ or to a soul permeated only with wisdom.

Another thing shared by Rudolf Steiner from his scientific spiritual clairvoyant research is that “When clairvoyant consciousness looks up into the Spiritual World, it makes a shattering impression to see how souls are fighting for their ideals, souls who in their last incarnation did not attain to Christ’s consciousness. Clairvoyant consciousness sees how souls are fighting for what is most dear to them, because Lucifer holds power over the souls and their ideals and he can separate them from the fruits which the whole world should taste as genuine fruits”.

Quite different is the picture of the souls who have let the benefit of their wisdom, the benefit of their soul be permeated with Christ – blessings which cast something like reflection in us and have a beneficial action even in this physical life. This can be felt as the most valuable inner warmth of soul, as comfort in the most severe experiences and this is actually the permeation with the Christ impulse.

WHAT DOES IMMORTALITY ACTUALLY MEAN

Many people read with a truly religious feeling, reread and even know by heart large parts and texts of the Bible, but this does not mean that they understand them. Let us take for example the things said by Apostle Paul. Materialism in our time is an obstacle for the deep inner understanding of modern man. Particularly with respect to concepts such as “sin” and “debt”. These deeper understandings can be acquired, naturally by the people who are looking for them, through studying the Spiritual Science of Anthroposophy.

Immortality of the human soul means the continuation of consciousness, of the I-consciousness after death. If man feels himself alive after death and is aware that he has not died and that he has some kind of consciousness, although the conditions surrounding him are different, this is not enough. After dying, man carries the heritage of his thinking, such as it was on the Earth.

If man worldview was limited only to his material understandings and interests, when he finds himself in a different world, where nothing is as it was on the earth – then what exists in that other world as life, what makes man a human being, will not be present for such a person. I already wrote about loneliness of man after death – to find yourself in a world, where you are aware that you are alive and awake, but you don’t have the consciousness to grasp the beings dwelling in that world and to communicate with them – this is something really very sad. For the Spiritual World, where there is no death, this state of mind means death in that world.

Immortality stands for the continuation of consciousness – finding yourself in a new world with new conditions and beings, expanding in it, in addition to the consciousness that you are alive, you should be able to communicate with this world, which is full of life and Beings. One can speak about immortality only when the individual consciousness is maintained.

This individual consciousness after death, however, depends on “debt” and “sin”. Some people, even if they have advanced in their spiritual understanding, think that believing in the fair law of karma means that the errors committed by an individual in some incarnation are carried forward in later times and in the course of incarnations there comes redemption of debts. Spiritual Science reveals that this is not so simple. Naturally, the correctly developing man will make efforts to live righteously and will try to rectify his errors and the wrong things he realizes he has done earlier, at least in his latest life. From the cosmic aspect, while we are on the Earth, we don’t have such memory to remember when and in which incarnation we made mistakes and committed sins. Our current life with the diseases we carry, our suffering, the losses we sustain and the probations we go through are the result of those past “unremembered” mistakes. In this life, we also often act incorrectly and commit wrongs, but becoming aware of them, we can rectify them while we are still living. There is always a way to do this and this is the meaning of paying off our debts. Thus, with respect to our personal perfection it is appropriate that each man makes personal endeavours to rectify his mistakes and not to commit sins. The sin we commit is not only our concern, affecting only us, but this sin is an objective fact in the world, in respect of the cosmos. The fact that, let us say, we caused physical suffering to someone, committed a murder, theft, blackmail, fraud, or caused some psychic suffering, we could rectify this in our next life by doing something to compensate our deed, but this culpable deed we committed would continue to exist for the objective course of the world. We should learn to make difference between the consequences of a sin for ourselves and the consequences of a sin for the objective progress of the world, in the higher worlds, which we don’t see. The cosmic justice always remains in existence. We make our mistakes, we carry the responsibility for them and strive to rectify them in the course of our incarnations, but the objective debt for the world remains. It is this debt that Christ undertook upon Himself and only He is capable of redeeming our debts. I have something more to say about this later, while now I want to draw your attention to a human foolishness, caused by curiosity, but such curiosity will be better restrained, until man has not changed his understanding in the right direction.

INCORRECTLY AIMED CURIOSITY

Today, a great number of people want to know their past incarnations. People are constantly asking me to recommend them such a clairvoyant and are ready to give their eyetooth and pay any price to find someone with the gift of seeing in the “past”. That is why there are so many charlatans trying to take advantage of human curiosity and turn it to their own account. The people who have this capacity would never use it, least of all for money. I already wrote about this, but still more needs to be explained. We need some knowledge how meaningless and also painful such a discovery will prove to be.

Rudolf Steiner explains the big mistake of those clairvoyants who dedicate to investigations of the Akasha Records (the Chronicle of Time) and study the time of earthly development before the Mystery on Golgotha – before Christ’s death on the Cross. Particularly the clairvoyants who are not permeated with Christ consciousness. The reason is that all the time they come across errors in the Akasha Records. In his book “Christ and the Human Soul”, he gives examples of famous clairvoyants today and their mistakes in investigating the Akasha. All of them were remarkable persons and left us a lot of books with their personal experience and knowledge, but their investigations abounded in mistakes, because they were not permeated with the Christ impulse. Only permeation with the Christ impulse makes the soul capable of seeing things such, as they really are and as they have arranged in the course of earthly development.

I understand very well and believe what Dr. Steiner said, because my numerous meetings with all kinds of clairvoyants proved the above to be true. Naturally, when an untrained person reads about Steiner’s investigations in a book, it is possible that he will not believe him. However, I have the experience and can tell you about lots of such meetings, if I have the time to do it, or bring out evidence, if the need arises.

Going back in my thoughts to the time, when I communicated with such clairvoyants and studied the information they collected, it seems to me that I myself was not ready to perceive in observation that those people never mentioned Christ. After that, I came to discover only that their prophecies did not come true. I will further say that some of them were wise men of high stature! – But they were not people with Christ consciousness either. I remember very well the book of the Tibetan Lama Tuesday Lobsang Rampa, whom I admired and read all his books. In his “Chapters of Life”, he made various prophecies about the future of mankind. What terrified me then was his prophecy that he saw a terrible war between Russia and China in 2004 and that the war would be waged more in the Cosmos than on the Earth. I read this in the early eighties of the last century and having full confidence in him, I followed the course of events with terrible apprehension. Well, all of us already know that this was not true, which is also valid for countless of other predictions by clairvoyants of today. During the years, which have gone by since then, I expanded and deepened my spiritual knowledge and gradually came to have my own understanding with respect to clairvoyance. I collected carefully and kept track of various clairvoyant statements in the newspapers, on TV, in books, only to find out that they were almost never true. Nevertheless, I don’t like you to think that I am reducing all clairvoyants to a common denominator. I have met and I know some quite convincing clairvoyants, but their predictions also do not always prove to be correct.

Concerning forecasts made by clairvoyants, particularly when they are announced publicly on the television or in the newspapers, they can cause mass psychosis of fear, which is very harmful. But media has released such a lot of these “predictions”, proving later to be absolutely wrong, that the sensible people do not pay attention to them any more. Therefore, let us recall what the Old Testament says in the chapter Deuteronomy, or the Fifth Book of Moses: “When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not happen or come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him.” I would like to give another quotation, even more suitable and acceptable for modern man: “Clairvoyance is like a cheque without cover” – Oscar Wilde.

In conclusion, we should say in this respect that clairvoyance achieved through correct spiritual development of man, striving for self-knowledge and initiation, is still very difficult to be attained today. The one who has attained it however, has clairvoyance of the will, while the soul permeated with Christ will never use it to earn money or to answer elementary questions.

Out of my personal experience, in defence of some clairvoyant-mediums having some kind of higher spiritual guidance, I would even say that their spiritual masters do not approve and refuse to give information on unimportant and stupid human questions. Such as let us say what the result of a given football match will be – in this case they will intentionally tell their medium a wrong answer, in order to punish him, to make him a laughing stock and make him eventually learn a lesson, and not answer elementary questions any more if he still wants to keep the contact. There are many such examples and I am sure a lot of the readers will also recall such cases.

ONLY CHRIST IS CAPABLE OF REDEEMING OUR DEBTS, TAKING THEM UPON HIMSELF

In the first place, we have to understand clearly that karma is not lifted from us. Karma is a law which manifests itself inexorably in our successive incarnations. What Cosmic Justice means, should be seen in the beginning out of our earthly judgment. The developing man has an increasing clarity as to when he errs or not. Most often, he is not unconscious of his mistakes – for various lies, fraud, murder, hellish plots, etc. The tricks, which are applied in our earthly life, so that someone might draw personal dividends, do not mean that this someone is not completely aware that they are unlawful, immoral or that they would hurt someone. Unfortunately, man knows it and they are most often done by people in powerful positions and high government posts, who carry responsibility before and for their nation. They know perfectly well, but they commit their wrong deeds nonetheless, trying to cover them up so that the others would somehow miss understand or notice them. They do not think about the karmic consequences of such deeds, because they are still not clear, truly not clear about how the karmic law operates practically in life. They heard, of course, something about karma, about destiny, but they don’t have the necessary understanding and reasoning in ordre to get scared of the consequences from their offences. If they knew and believed in the inexorable cosmic law, they would never commit their terrible egotistic sins. Those are the people who err intentionally from a moral point of view and cover up their mistakes, being at the same time perfectly aware that they are immoral. What it means for them from the cosmic aspect as a sin and a debt, well, they really don’t have as yet the necessary knowledge about this.

There are, however, and thank God about this, other people with pure souls, honest, consciously striving all their life not to do injustice and intentional transgressions, or, if they become aware of them, they immediately try to rectify them. A lot of people are going by such means towards perfection, consciously improving and clearing up the “debts” of past errors. At least, such misdeeds which they remember, for example, that they offended or falsely accused someone undeservedly or unjustly, or that they inflicted to someone a physical or psychic trauma, etc. Sooner or later their debts will be paid off, if they become conscious of them, but only on the Earth. The debt in respect to the cosmos remains. For this reason we need to make our soul ever more awake for the Christ, to pray to Christ not only for us, but also for other sinners. We need to know why exactly Christ is the Saviour of mankind and to strive ever more strongly to relate to Him. Then our bad deeds on the Earth will be taken up by Christ, because only He has the power and the might to redeem our debts and sins, which otherwise would remain existing in the Spiritual World as objective sins.

How can we understand this? In the book “Christ and the Human Soul” by Steiner, we can find some suggestive examples from the Bible: the woman committing adultery who was brought before Christ and scoffed at for her deeds. Christ wrote something on the earth, but did not blame her, did not damn her, He forgave her instead. Why? Because karma is always active, it is objectively fair. The deeds were already committed by this woman and could not be erased, that is why Christ wrote them down on the earth. Some day she would clear up the earthly consequence with righteous, exemplary life and conduct, but it is a different matter with the spiritual consequences of things – Christ undertakes them upon Himself. The fact that He absolved her does not mean that He erased the sin committed at a certain time in the absolute meaning, but that He undertook upon Himself the consequences of what she did, which would have remained as an objective sin.

Another example – the criminal hanged crucified to the right of Christ acknowledged as a fact that they, the two criminals deserved their punishment, but he was aware that the Man hanged between them did not do anything wrong. He turned to Him and said “Lord, remember me when You come into Your kingdom”, and Jesus answered “Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise”. This means that because of his repentance and acknowledgement of faith in Him, Christ absolved him. He absolved and undertook the objective debt of the criminal, something only He can do. Concerning the earthly debt, as an earthly deed, sooner or later, in another life, he will have to pay it off on the Earth.

When Christ gave powers to those who, acting in His name, could give absolution, no one understood such absolutions as meaning that they would block the action of karma. No, sin will be purified on the Earth by each man through his repentance and through good deeds, but only by searching the relation to Christ, accepting Him in our souls. In this way Christ would be able to act in people and take away their sins in a kingdom, where man has no power to erase his sins. In that kingdom, only Christ can undertake and erase debts. With this mission, which Christ gave to His apostles, we can understand that the earthly kingdom will be saved for such a man, who stands in relation to Christ, while the spiritual consequences, which are objective facts, will be undertaken and rectified by Him in the karma to come.

When Christ tells somebody “Your sins are forgiven”, this means that the man can truly expect one day his personal karmic repayment of his debts and sins, but they are transformed by Christ in such manner that He Himself will erase the debts and the sins He has undertaken. “Your sins are forgiven” means: Your sins are already a cosmic, not a karmic, fact. The forgiveness of the sins does not mean that the sin has been obliterated in an absolute sense – man will have to rectify it personally in his next incarnations, but the spiritual consequences of his sins can be undertaken only by Christ.

Maybe all this will be difficult to understand by a person hearing it for the first time, but it is worthwhile to think over and reflect on these examples.

Most important of all said so far is to understand that man has to form relation to Christ on the earth before he dies. It can be through a prayer, thought, meditation, invocation, reading the right books, in a manner man himself chooses, but he should fill his mind, heart and soul with understanding and gratitude to Christ the God, Who through self-sacrifice made it possible for us to feel ever more human. This also means feeling in our soul the need of re-acquiring our connection with the Spiritual World and with the Spiritual Hierarchies. The man who has connected with Christ on the earth, which can be done through the correct understanding of the significance of Christ and His rescuing mission for mankind, such man will contemplate Christ after his death; otherwise, in the place where he has to see Him, he will see only empty space.