Spiritual Physics: The Future? Or A Bridge Too Far?

The time has come to realize that an interpretation of the universe . . . remains unsatisfying unless it covers the interior as well as the exterior of things; mind as well as matter. The true physics is that which will, one day, achieve the inclusion of man in his wholeness in a coherent picture of the world. —Teilhard de Chardin.

“Spiritual Physics” is not a standard scientific or academic discipline — not yet, anyway. Not yet, because the term involves a nascent glimpse into the distant future. This novel synthesis term anticipates Teilhard’s Omega Point, an “already but not yet” tension in human evolution between being and becoming, matter and spirit that fulfills his vision. It will also satisfy the late Thomas Berry’s mandate to combine modern science with anceint wisdom traditions in telling a new universe story (meta-story) for an ailing and divided planet.

In Teilhard’s model the majority of Earth’s synthesis thinkers are currently in Noogenesis, or “noogenic mode.” Whereas previous evolutionary stages (geogenesis and biogenesis) were governed by unthinking instinctual processes, the noogenic stage is driven by directed, collective human intelligence that accelerates evolution in a completely new direction. This has evolved through the accumulation and transmission of knowledge, holistic thinking, and the use of technology, which Teilhard remarkably foresaw and his cosmogenic model foreshadowed. Here, individual minds and their ideas interact, integrate, and unify toward an understanding of consciousness as fundamental and unitive, and the cosmos as whole and interconnected.

Teilhard integrates science, faith, and evolution with intellectual and theological rigor, seeing consciousness as the “within of things,” and the cosmos converging through complexity-consciousness toward Christogenesis, and Christ Omega. However, in some synthesis circles, New Age theology has replaced (hijacked?) Teilhard’s definition of noogenesis with an eclectic spirituality that also centers on consciousness as fundamental and deepening. Like Teilhard, New Age “theology” also rejects strict materialism, values inner transformation, and embraces cosmic evolution, but unlike Teilhard struggles with coherence, depth, and discernment. Lacking depth, coherence, and specificity, New Age perspectives are neither science or spirituality in the strictest sense, showing little scientific rigor or theological consistency in integrating both. In its effort to be inclusive, New Age theology is indeed broad and eclectic, yet is vague, shallow, and risks narcissism in its utopian vision of harmony without spiritual clarity, grounding, and a substantive definition of God–identity and/or spiritual selfhood.

In its diffuse and diluted attempt to democratize and unify science and religion, New Age eclecticism substitutes the word “universe” for the words God, Spirit, or divinity, depersonalizing the latter. Most significantly, its undefined synthesis model beyond the noogenesis stage also circumvents Teilhard’s central cosmogenic challenge to take up the synthesis gauntlet in giving definition and specificity to the universal radial energy that comprises the heart of matter (“within of things”), and which is at once conscious, has depth, evolves, coheres, transforms, and is the non–material substance of all visible form. Nothing less than knowing what God is in that way, where and how that happens organically in the space (nexus) between two worlds to the nth degree, can fulfill he noblest dream of mankind, that of the imbued theologian-scientist. Only that integral head-on endeavor and discovery, not a pseudo-science/spirituality synthesis employing crystals, psychedelics, astrology, and euphemisms will truly democratize and unite all science, religion, philosophy, and the arts under the banner of a single cosmic energy (like light) and icon (phi double-spiral).

Nonetheless, an advancing cosmogenic model calls us to be futurists, with an eye toward where humanity is going, not so much where it has been or currently stands as a species, but as persons in varying modes of transformational process. The noogenic stage is about transcending individual consciousness and achieving collective super-consciousness on the road to Omega. Just as Teilhard anticipated a future spirit-science synthesis, so must noogenic and christogenic illuminates and visionaries anticipate the future evolutionary implications of same as they abide, transcend, and advance beyond noogenic mode in universal unitive consciousness. The word “universe,” after all, means to “to turn around on one thing.” And those on a quest to identify same must plausibly name that one thing.

Visualizing same may anticipate the future for some, yet be a “bridge too far” for those yet challenged to attain holistic thinking, cosmic spiritual consciousness and/or God-identity, to say nothing of anticipating what might come afterward in Christogenesis or Omega. It would be a stretch for a teen to envision what the experience of adulthood would be like while in the process of transitioning to same. Such takes years, if not decades of trial and error living, and attained wisdom. Its nigh impossible to sail a ship while building it, much less to approximate or anticipate a clear destination without a defined, co-inherent spirit-science cosmotheology map to guide one there.

The physical laws of the universe (outer space) reflect its spiritual laws and principles (inner space), the former mirroring the latter via correspondense in liminal space, the space between both worlds. Spiritual physics is a phrase now used to describe attempts to bridge the laws of physics with metaphysical or spiritual principles, the physics that science doesn’t yet fully understand but is just beginning to entertain and discover. Examples are best revealed in the gap (synapse) where science meets mystery, of late surrounding such anomalous phenomena as crop circle formations, the Shroud of Turin, and anti-gravity propulsion systems (zero-point energy) the author has reported on in recent blog entries. Think of it as an effort to treat spirit or consciousness as a real dimension of the universe governed by patterns as constant as natural law, because it IS an integral part of natural law that science is on the frontier of discovering with greater awareness and depth; but only for those transcending binary perception, thought, and reductionist-materialistic mind-sets, the bane of future spirit-science research.

Core ideas in Spiritual Physics: (1) Reality begins not with matter but with awareness, or consciousness, as physicists like Federico Faggin propose, and mystics have claimed for centuries. Because consciousness is fundamental, science cannot get behind it as causal, so physical laws are seen as expressions of deeper laws of consciousness. (2) Energy and spirit are two sides of one coin (see the author’s previous blog entry on Teilhard’s Mystical Bridge). Nikola Tesla hinted at this, the universe as vibration and resonance, alive with subtle energy. And Teilhard described matter (tangential energy) as the “without” of spirit, and spirit (radial energy) as the “within” of matter. (3) Instead of breaking reality into isolated parts (reductionism) as science is wont to do, spiritual physics assumes an interconnected web (holism) where inner and outer, subject and object, observer and observed are continuous. (4) In Teilhard’s cosmogenesis everything evolves toward greater complexity, consciousness, and union (Omega Point). This gives physics a spiritual directionality, not just entropy but convergence and centration in the interior life of humans. (5) Just as gravity organizes matter, spiritual physics assumes laws of attraction, correspondence, resonance, and consciousness that organize experience and the unfolding of the cosmos.

Summarizing, spiritual physics is the study of how consciousness, energy, and matter interrelate under a unified framework. It treats what religions call “spirit” not as supernatural, but as the deep dimension of natural law that science is only beginning to understand, and can only understand by broadening the bandwidth of awareness via spiritual awakening and realization (unitive consciousness). In the author’s view nothing is more supernatural than the natural, or more natural than the supernatural for those with eyes to see (see diagram at the top). For Teilhard, consistent with the teachings of his wisdom tradition, spirituality is primarily about seeing.

The author suggests drawing together what he considers the three biggest spirit-science contributors past whose works best provide the synthesis threads that actually converge, offering us an integrated vision of the future in and beyond the evolutionary apex of Christogenesis and the Omega Point — Federico Faggin, Telhard de Chardin, and Nikola Tesla (see the author’s next blog entry on Baking a Spirit-Science Layer Cake)

Physicist and inventor Federico Faggin (best known for inventing the microprocessor) turned toward consciousness as fundamental in later work. Faggin argues that consciousness is not emergent from matter but is the vertically caused ground of reality, with matter being a representation or interface within consciousness. His novel framework suggests physics is incomplete without integrating qualia and inner experience (click-on blue resource box at the top for Faggin’s full explanation)

Teilhard de Chardin saw evolution as a cosmic process moving toward greater complexity and consciousness or “complexification,” leading to an Omega Point. His “within of things” parallels Faggin’s claim that everything has an inside (consciousness) and an outside (matter). Teilhard’s cosmogenesis is essentially a spiritual physics of convergence, where energy and consciousness are two sides of the same coin (see the author’s prior blog diagram on Teilhard’s Mystical Bridge, gravity and electromagnetism as paired opposites in cosmic alternating current pulsations).

Nikola Tesla believed in an etheric medium and saw light energy as the animating principle of the cosmos. His experiments and musings suggested the universe is a living system of vibrations, where resonance, frequency, and vibration link all things. He sometimes spoke in spirit-science terms, describing inspiration and insight as coming from a higher intelligence or field.

The pioneeringnotions of all three men converge (a) by envisioning consciousness as primary (unifying ground/field of the cosmos), (b) by seeing matter as an expression of Spirit/Energy (symbolic interface, “without of things,” matter as energy in vibration), and (c) by anticipating a spiritual physics of the future. All three push beyond reductionist physics toward a metaphysics that integrates subjectivity, meaning, and spirit into natural law. This could indeed be called “spiritual physics,” not in the sense of religion replacing science, or vice versa, but in extending science into the dimension of understanding energy, resonance, connecting inner/outer worlds, (particularly the inner life) and consciousness.

Together these visionaries, each with a well–defined spiritual consciousness and identity, sketch a unified worldview where consciousness is not an afterthought, but the core fabric of reality. That is why many, including the author, consider their work as the most integral “spiritual physics” synthesis to date and hope for the future. The overlap among these three visionaries are integrative, including the best of New Age perspectives, and (1) see science, spirituality, and psychology as interconnected rather than divided, (2) affirm human dignity, reminding persons they are more than material beings, (3) offer practices that reduce stress, encourage wholeness, and holistic health, (4) recognize Earth and humanity as part of a larger evolutionary process.

Consciousness = Spirit = Light, the invisible substance and activity of all visible form under one  universal generative substance (singularity) = a cosmic energy and information field = God. Looking forward, mankind shall no longer live by separation consciousness (binary thinking) of institutional religion, or materialist–reductionist science alone (quanta), but by every word (qualia) that proceeds from the mouth and writing of its mystics, spiritually informed wisdom teachers, and future-looking spiritual physicists.

And the author? He’s a light being and light worker here to help reveal an untold fragment of a cosmic story, a tiny part of the universe become aware of itself, its origin, and identity in a less limited, more advanced way.

About the Author

Joseph C. Masterleo, LCSW-DCSW, is a clinical social worker in private practice in Syracuse NY, and Rockledge FL. His half-century of service in the mental health care field includes faith-based counseling, with an emphasis on psycho-spiritual integration. His subspecialty involves developing a novel paradigm for the synthesis of science, religion, and psychology, identifying the energy and geometric patterns that connect the quantum world with space-time. His model explains how spirit and matter can co-exist as two facets of one reality in a unified field, dissolving the walls of partition between previously siloed disciplines. Inspired by the writings of Thomas Merton (ecumenism), Teilhard de Chardin (synthesis), Thomas Berry (ecotheology), Nikola Telsa (electromagnetism), and others, his objective is to tell a new, future-looking story for the Ecozoic Age, one that forms a connecting bridge between the biblical story of creation, modern science, and ancient cosmologies. His columns on these and related subjects have appeared on websites such as The Center for Christogenesis, Progressive Christianity, and in newsprint via The Goodnews Paper, the Syracuse Post Standard, and the Syracuse Sports Magazine, where he comments on sports as reflecting the best and worst of American character and culture. Further information about Joe and his Spirit-Science model can be found in his book, The Ambient Christ, the Untold Story of God in Science, Scripture, and Spirituality, listed on Amazon Books, Barnes & Noble, and on his website www.joeknowsgod.com

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