Alice Bailey & Djwhal Khul - Problems of Humanity - V - The Failure of the
Churches







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Problems of Humanity - Chapter V - The Problem of the Churches





Today men's minds are recognizing the dawn of freedom; they
are realizing that every man should be free to worship God in his own way. This will not
mean (in the coming new age) that every man will pick a theological school to which he
will choose to adhere. His own God-illumined mind will search for truth and he will
interpret it for himself. The day of theology is over and that of a living truth is with
us. This the orthodox churches refuse to recognize. Truth is essentially
non-controversial; where controversy emerges, the concept is usually secondary in
importance and consists largely of men's ideas about truth.Men have gone far
today in the rejection of dogmas and doctrine and this is good and right and encouraging.
It signifies progress, but, as yet, the churches fail to see in this the workings of
divinity. Freedom of [129] thought, the questioning of presented truths, a refusal to
accept the teachings of the churches in terms of the past theology, and a rejection of
imposed ecclesiastical authority are characteristic of creative spiritual thinking at this
time; this is regarded by orthodox churchmen as indicative of dangerous tendencies and as
a turning away from God and, consequently, of a loss of the sense of divinity. It
indicates exactly the reverse.
Perhaps as
serious, because of its effect upon untold thousands of the more ignorant public, are the
materialistic and political ambitions of the churches. In the Eastern faiths this is not
so prominently the case; in the Western world this tendency is fast bringing on the
degeneration of the churches. In the Oriental religions a disastrous negativity has
prevailed; the truths given out have not sufficed to better the daily life of the believer
or to anchor the truths creatively upon the physical plane. The effect of the Eastern
doctrines is largely subjective and negative as to daily affairs. The negativity of the
theological interpretations of the Buddhist and Hindu Scriptures have kept the people in a
quiescent condition from which they are slowly beginning to emerge. The Mohammedan faith
is, like the Christian, a positive presentation of truth though very materialistic; both
these faiths have been militant and political in their activities.
The great Western faith, Christianity, has been definitely objective in its
presentation of truth; this was needed. It has been militant, fanatical, grossly
materialistic and ambitious. It has combined political objectives with pomp and ceremony,
with great stone structures, with power and an imposed authority of a most cramping
nature.
The early Christian Church (which was relatively pure in its presentation of truth and
in its living processes) eventually split into three main divisions - [130] the Roman
Catholic Church which today seeks to make capital out of the claim that it was the Mother
Church, the Byzantine or Greek Orthodox Church and the Protestant Churches. All of them
split away on the question of doctrine and all of them were originally sincere and clean
and relatively pure and good. All have steadily deteriorated since the day of their
inception and today the following sad and serious situation can be found:
1. The
Roman Catholic Church is distinguished by three things which are all contrary to the
spirit of Christ:
An intensely materialistic attitude. The Church of Rome stands for great stone
structures - cathedrals, churches, institutions, convents, monasteries. In order to build
them, the policy down the centuries has been to drain the money out of the pockets of rich
and poor alike. The Roman Catholic Church is a strictly capitalistic church. The money
gathered into its coffers supports a powerful ecclesiastical hierarchy and provides for
its many institutions and schools.
A far-reaching and farsighted political program in which temporal power is the goal and
not the welfare of the little people. The present program of the Catholic Church has
definite political implications; their attitude to Communism has in it the seeds of
another world war. The political activities of the Catholic Church have not built for
peace, no matter under what guise they are presented.
A planned policy whereby the mass of the people are kept in intellectual ignorance and,
through this ignorance, are naturally to be found among the reactionary and conservative
forces which are so powerfully at work resisting the new age with its [131] new
civilization and more enlightened culture. Blind faith and complete confidence in the
priest and in the Vatican are regarded as spiritual duties.

The Roman
Catholic Church stands entrenched and unified against any new and evolutionary
presentation of truth to the people; its roots are in the past but it is not growing into
the light; its vast financial resources enable it to menace the future enlightenment of
mankind under the cloak of paternalism and a colorful outer appearance which hides a
crystallization and an intellectual stupidity which must inevitably spell its eventual
doom, unless the faint stirrings of new life following the advent of Pope John XXIII can
be nourished and developed.





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