God is eternal, while the perceptions of Him are transient

No living being survives without inner contact with the Creator. In animals, this contact is compulsory. Man differs from animals in that his intuitive faith in God is complemented by conscious faith.

When a person consciously denies God, either he dies, or a compulsory mechanism of return to faith in God begins to influence him. This process is brilliantly described in the Old Testament. God warns, addressing the Jews:

«If you stop walking in My ways (that is, lose Divine logic), if you stop obeying the commandments (that is, restraining your instincts), then you will be scattered throughout the earth, and other nations will humiliate and insult you, and your children will suffer and die, and your wives will become barren, - and then from a numerous people you will become a few.»

God directly tells people that only continuous suffering can save their descendants if faith, love, and morality are lost. So, first, let's try to admit that we are sick.

Homosexuality and pedophilia, family breakdown, women's emancipation, the cult of money and pleasure, the increasing number of troubled children and infertility - these signs are becoming increasingly obvious. But it is not only necessary to admit that we are sick by making a diagnosis, but also to find means of treatment.

I remember, long ago, in the 1960s, in the magazine «Around the World», I read an interesting article about how communication between two civilizations occurs. The exchange of everyday objects happens very quickly, much slower is the interaction and unification on a spiritual level: habits, customs, culture. Religious traditions are preserved the longest and do not mix. Why does this happen?

Because the core of what we call civilization is religion. As long as there is religion, there is a certain people and civilization. God is eternal, while perceptions of Him are transient. When religion completes its cycle of development and begins to die, civilization dies with it.

Apparently, Western Christian civilization has exhausted its resources. Researchers rightly associate this with the degradation of Christian religion. And priests talk about the imminent end of the world and the second coming of Jesus Christ. So will Christian civilization rise again or not?

In the first centuries of its existence, Christianity existed in a sufficiently distorted form, and then split into various religious movements. The teaching of Christ turned into a teaching about Christ. The essence of the teaching was replaced by the biography of its founder. People began to focus on his biography rather than on what he called for - that is, form replaced content.

The current post-Christian world is now in a sorry state. The diagnosis of its incurable disease is simple and clear. Pseudo-Christianity is dying, and resurrection is a return to the teaching of Jesus Christ, which his followers still have not understood and accepted. Christianity made people free.

If God lives in your soul, can you internally submit to someone, even if that «someone» is a priest? Of course not. Liberation from slavery, Christ taught, comes not through a king or even through a spiritual leader. This liberation is achieved through overcoming internal slavery.

A person who worships instincts becomes their slave. A person who only externally obeys commandments will eventually become a slave to his instincts internally. As long as our human «self» is at the forefront for us, as long as instincts and life itself are more important to us than love, overcoming internal slavery is impossible.

The pain of the soul remains unbearable. The intolerability of soul pain is an indicator of internal slavery. Our human «self» is to some extent an illusion, while our Divine «self» is the true reality. Only the awareness that we are children of God, that we are part of the Creator, that our true «self» is eternal and consists of love - only this gives us a chance for salvation. This is the essence of the teaching of Jesus Christ. This is the path to the salvation of the present civilization.

Why then could people not understand Jesus Christ? Why did the flowering turn into degradation? Why do almost none of us have a future left? Why do Orthodoxy, Catholicism, and Protestantism not understand each other? How did this imperceptible decay begin?

To understand all this, first, you need to answer the three main questions of any philosophy and religion: who are we, where did we come from, and where are we going?

S.N. Lazarev, «Survival Experience. Part 7»